As Perusual Meeting You
by InkFlow
Summary: They didn't meet in the most usual way, Matthew was naked running through the hall after Alfred, who stole his clothes, and Ivan just standing, observing. But once the crazyness calms down and a new frienship is found, a whole new journey begins for them in facing their nightmares and saving their families . Human names used, Ruscan. Violence and such, you have been warned.
1. Who Was that Running Stark Naked?

As Perusual Meeting You

By: InkFlow

It was a seemingly normal day in school for Ivan Braginski. He went to classes, did his work, and and ate lunch with his two sisters, as perusual. He felt that this would just be another boring, average day that would just pass by, unimportant. But today was important, even if nobody knew it. It was November 7th and a beautiful fall day with a light wind and georgous autumn trees were everywhere dropping dead leaves to blow in the wind.

Though it wasn't until the end of this school day that the normality decided to take a break and let chaos take over for a bit. Soon Ivan's life took a skip on it's path, what could possibly come of it?

~owo~

Ivan was at his locker getting the items that he needed for his last class of the day. The hallway was generally quiet with a few students chatting with each other here and there. Then, Ivan heard a loud laughing voice and foot steps that seemed to be at a running pace. It came up and by Ivan quick. He turned around to see who it was, but judging on the laugh and the figure's voice, Ivan could easily tell that it was Alfred.

"Hahahahaha! C'mon it was just a joke Mattie! Hahaha!" Alfred zoomed by laughing his loud, irritating laugh.

To explain, Alfred was considered to be one of the "popular" boys. He liked to play pranks on people much like his friend Gilbert; and of course with help from their friend Antonio. Alfred often adressed himself as the 'hero' or 'leader' of their little pack of "popular boys." Alfred and Ivan weren't fond of each other either, it was an easy,mutual feeling for them to dislike each other.

It wasn't quite hate in Ivan's mind because they seemed to avoid each other enough not to let it grow too big, and they were able to work well enough to do school projects together. Ivan remembers one time when he and Alfred worked on a small project in Ap chemistry together without any snide remarks or problems. Granted, Alfred was abnormally quiet and not quite his usual nuisance self (Ivan just assumed that it was either a personal problem that he sould not pry into or an effect of some of their project's fumes) that he didn't start any kinds of fights between them. So there was a certain degree where they could handle each other Ivan assumed.

Ivan caught a quick glance at the running figure of Alfred in his normal clothes. He had on jeans, a regular white t-shirt with the McDonalds m on it, black convers, and his strange WWII bomber jacket. The Large 50 stitched on the back stared at Ivan as Alfred continued to run and push through the crowds of the hallway not stopping for anything, much less anyone.

Ivan also took note of the set of clothes swinging from Alfred's hand as he ran. It looked to be the standard gym uniform along with jeans and a red t-shirt. And... underwear...ewe... Alfred was holding someone's boxers with little red maple leaves printed all over in a dancing manner. Ivan slightly smirked to himself as he realized what Alfred's prank was this time: He simply stole someone's clothes so now they were somewhere naked in the school!

Soon Ivan heard another voice following Alfred's. This voice was much more quiet, espically compaired to Alfred's voice, and had a slight familar ring to Ivan that he couldn't quite put his finger on. Even though the second voice was obviously yelling at Alfred, it had a light whispering tone that seemed to lace the voice. Yet what really confused Ivan was the fact that the second voice was speaking another language. At first Ivan wasn't quite sure what language it was, but after a moment of listening he realized that they were speaking (ahem* "yelling") french.

"Alfred salaud! Ce n'est pas drôle, me redonner mes vêtements j'ai besoin d'eux!" The voice whisper-yelled.

Ivan felt a little happy as he thought of the frenchman suffering from one of Alfred's pranks. He giggled to himself lightly and looked over to the frenchman to see the 'damage' that had been done on this (probably innocent) person. Once he turned he was greeted by an odd and rather disturbing veiw. But nothing less than what he had expected.

Streaking by was a rather pale dirty blond that look abnormally similar to Alfred. As if they were twins, siblings, or something perposterous like that. But as far as Ivan knew Alfred was an only child. This boy was streeking, yes definitly streeking through that hallways. He was stark naked with nothing more than his hands to cover his shame. As the boy sped pass Ivan, he saw a small tattoo on his back, left shoulder blade in the shape of a little red maple leaf.

As the two kept running Ivan smiled to himself at the strange and amusing scene that had just played before him and various other students in the hallway. Soon after, a hall moniter was chasing after them panting hard from trying to keep up with the two speeding boys. He wore a birght pink vest (not the usual hall moniter uniform) with neon yellow reflector tape lining various areas on his bright vest.

"Like stop guys! Geeze!" Called the little hall moniter. Ivan recognized it was Feliks, the strange polish boy who was somewhat obssessed with fashon and design. "Like seriously guys, stop! I can't keep up, this is, like, sooo not cool!" And he ran on trying to keep up with naked boy and Alfred, the two speeding rockets.

~owo~

Ivan was curious as to who naked boy was. He couldn't wrap his head around the strange look-alikeness to Alfred, and the lingering familarity of his whispering french voice. If Ivan recalled right Alfred called naked boy Mattie... well that rung some kind of bell he had heard Alfred talk about a person named Mattie before. Other than that though, Ivan had no clue who he was, his name didn't ring any bells for any of Ivan's class mates.

Whatever the case of whom naked boy could be, Ivan needed to head to class before the bell rang and he was late. His next class was art and he could paint magnificent sunflowers to take his mind off of naked boy.

Maybe he'll see him again.

~oUo~

Author's Note: Well this is my first fan fiction and I hope that those of you who read this will like it! The idea just one day came to me (after drawing a picture of the streeking) and I had to write this up. I worked fairly hard on this, so please tell me what you think! ovo

Ok, ok, I know that I used the second spelling of streeking wrong in some way (sorry I couldn't find any other spelling of the word that would work, so this was the closest). So all that the second spelling of streeking is, is an action where someone strips themselves of their clothes and run through a large crowd of people (ie: sports events, buissness meetings, etc...), for thoes of you who didn't know, but poor Mattie (Canada) did not do this intentionally. It was all Alfred's fault! I DO NOT encourage you to go streeking, no matter how much fun it sounds.

Oh, and if I confused ya, Russia is mentally calling Canada 'Naked boy' since he does not know his name and that was Canada's first impression on Russia. In the next chapter Russia will be mentelly calling Canada that a lot until he learns his name.

Disclaimer: I do not own anything in this fan fiction except for it's very screwed up plot line. Hetalia belongs to Hidekaz Himaruya and all that jazz.

Countries names (in case you were confused):

Canada: Matthew Williams (aka: Mattie/naked boy)

Russia: Ivan Braginski

America: Alfred F. Jones

Poland: Feliks Łukasiewicz

Translation:

Alfred salaud! Ce n'est pas drôle, me redonner mes vêtements j'ai besoin d'eux!: Alfred you bastard! This isn't funny, give me back my clothes I need them!

Omg Russia didn't say da! I'll have to include it in the next chapter (which will be out in about a week). Reviews please!

~InkFlow


	2. Meeting Naked Boy

As Perusual Meeting You

Chapter 2: Meeting Naked Boy

It was the end of the school day, just after Ivan's art class, and Ivan was feeling cheery as always after this class. He may have had a pile of homework to do for the night, but he felt happy.

Ivan closed his locker after putting away some of his supplies away and grabbing a couple of his assignments. As he walked up to the office to exit through the front door, Ivan reminded himself that he would be walking home alone for today. Both of his sisters were busy, his younger sister, Natalia, would be at lacross, and his older sister, Katyusha, said she was working on a project with a few friends. So they would be arriving home later for the day.

Ivan was walking passed the office when one of the doors leading into the office flew open right in front of him. He was startled, but not as much when suddenly a smallish figure crashed into him upon exiting the office doors. Ivan stumbled from the force of the contact but managed to stay standing . The other person, who had crashed into Ivan, was not so lucky, and fell backwards onto another who had been following close behind him from the office.

"Ahh!" The two screamed as they fell over each other.

Ivan managed to regain his balance and looked down on the two who had ran into him. It was naked boy and Alfred... Only this time naked boy wasn't naked. He wore the jeans and t-shirt that Alfred was running with earlier, and held a gym unifrom in his arms. Naked boy glance up at Ivan with wide eyes through his crooked glasses.

"Oh, sorry about that," Ivan said as he grabbed naked boy by the arm and hoisted the smaller boy up.

"O-oh, s-sorry. Désolé," the boy whispered in a low, quiet voice while adjusting the wire rimmed glasses on his face and fixing his eyes to the ground, as if he was afraid to make eye contact with Ivan.

Ivan was about to do the same with Alfred. But Alfred simply hopped up and onto his feet with a little "Hahaha!" Then promptly turned towards naked boy and started chatting away with him.

"Mattie! Dude! What the-" Alfred stopped himself, noticing Ivan in their way, "Oh, I get it," he growled and glared slightly at Ivan. Alfred's eyes looked up and down Ivan, as if scanning him for any potential weapons that could be hidden on his person.

Ivan couldn't say that he was much to look at right at the moment. His hair was slightly mussed up with bits of paint here and there staining it. His eyes were tired from staying up some later nights working on his homework after helping Natalia with some of her own. His own face and hands had various small paint splotches on them from his art class just before. Not to mention Ivan's clothes, they were his same long jacket, tannish-pinkish scarf, and pitch black boots that he wore nearly everyday; each of them well worn out from love, washes, and time. So, he wasn't too surprised to see Alfred scowl at his appearance after looking over him.

"Ya damn commie! Waddaya think you're d-"

"Alfred!" Naked boy growled, his voice slightly raised, but still in a light whisper. Naked boy turned to Ivan, "Sorry about that Ivan, he gets a little quick to judge sometimes," he apologizes in a much softer voice than that, that was used towards Alfred.

Ivan was about to reply with a simple 'It's ok,' when he realized something. Naked boy called him Ivan, he called him by his name. Did naked boy know Ivan? As far as Ivan was concerned he didn't know naked boy... Did he? But how? They had never met, right? Looking at the boy with complete confusion on his face Ivan asked: "H-how do you know my name?" Damn, he scolded himself mentally for stuttering.

Now it was naked boy's turn to be confused, yet after a moment to process what Ivan had said, he sighed, as if this was completely normal and nothing strange. Ivan was still confused. "Ivan, we have Ap chemistry and art together. You do know that, right?" Naked boy said the second part dryly with his arms crossed over his chest still holding the gym clothes. His eyes peered up at Ivan through his shinned over glasses squinting slightly as he gave Ivan a look of: _Seriously, are you kidding me right now?_

Ivan paused and thought for a moment, a little bell in his head rang as he vaguely remembered a quiet boy in both of thoes classes. Yet Ivan assumed that the boy was Alfred.

"We did a small chemistry project together..." The boy continued, trying to refresh Ivan's memory.

Now Ivan did remember the small chemistry project, but he was still confused, "But, I thought that was Alf-"

"Please," naked boy jeered, "You actually think Alfred is smart enough to get into Ap Chemistry?" He had cut Ivan off in a way that made it seem as if naked boy was anticipating Ivan's comment.

"Well that is true," Ivan mumbled to himself, Alfred heard anyways.

"Hey!" Alfred yelled, "C'mon bro, lets go home. He obviously doesn't remember who you are, so we don't have to deal with this," he said putting his arm over naked boy's shoulder, giving Ivan a disgusted look.

Naked boy was fairly pissed right about now, his grabbed Alfred's arm and jerked it off his shoulder. "OK! For one thing you have detention to go to _again,_ because of that stupid prank you played on me earlier. And qui êtes-vous the one to go off judging people on who remembers me and such? You're my own _brother_ and you forget who I am sometimes. Not to mention how you almost always ignore me unless it involves pranking me with help from your bloody friends or dragging me into one of your stupide pranks when your friends won't agree to help! Je peux gérer mes propres problèmes sans votre aide, mister 'hero.'" He said hero while putting up his fingers bunny ear style to imply the quotations around the word. "Now go to dentention before I faites glisser l'extrémité arrière il y a and insist on a worse punisment for dad to give you than what he already might have planned!" Naked boy's voice wasn't much of a yell, it was more at what people would consider at talking voulme, but none the less it had a dark piercing tone in it. He huffed from his little rant and began to stop off towards the front door leaving Ivan dumbfounded yet slightly amused from the boy's anger, while Alfred sputtered words, scared slightly at the sudden outburst directed towards him.

"Bu-but Mattie..." Alfred's voice trailed off, "I won't do it again, I promise broski," Alfred spoke in a very light voice, which surpirsed Ivan that he could get his voice that quiet and soft.

"Whatever," naked boy grumbled, still heading to the front door, "Hoser," he whispered faintly for no one but himself to hear.

Alfred Immidiatly turned to face Ivan and glared at him shoving his pointer finger in Ivan's face, "This," he gestured to naked boy, "Is all _your_ fault," he then headed to the detention classroom, not letting Ivan get in a word otherwise.

Ivan was now less confused, but more amused after just witnessing the two boy's tempers, though slightly pissed that Alfred blamed naked boy's rant on Ivan. Yet at the moment that didn't really matter, he needed to go and figure out who naked boy was; a name would really help him. He began to jog over to naked boy bringing up his arm in a slight waving fashion.

"Hey you, wait up!" He called towards naked boy.

Naked boy slowed and turned to partly face Ivan. His face softened a bit when he saw it wasn't his brother, but still remained in a frown. Ivan caught up to him by the time he began to speak. "What is it that you want Ivan?" Naked boy said in his normal, whispered voice, his tone biting a bit when he said Ivan's name.

"I was wondering if you would like to walk with me home until we have to part ways. Da?" Ivan asked.

Naked boy looked up at Ivan with a shocked and rather confused look on his face. This left Ivan even more amused. The boy came up to about his eyes which made Ivan giggle childishly a tiny bit, most of it being held in, because he was well amused at that point already and few people came up to be almost as tall as Ivan. He towered over people at a height of 6'5" (195.6 cm) so it was somewhat rare to find people up to even his nose.

"Well... umm, sure. That sounds fine, I-I guess," the boy said almost reluctantly, and somewhat confused. He fixed his eyes back down to the ground as they walked through the front doors of the school.

"Good, da?" Ivan replied smiling almost like a kid who was trying to show off a tooth he had just lost, though most of it was covered up by his scarf.

"D-da? W-what does that mean?" The boy asked tilting his head up slightly to look at Ivan through the corner of his eye.

"Hmm?" Ivan furrowed his brows a bit at the question, "Oh. Da, it means yes in russian," pause, "I noticed that earlier you were yelling in _french_," Ivan stated.

"O-oh yeah well my papa's french soo... I learned it from him. Hehe," naked boy laughed lightly while he rubbed the back of his neck wearing a sheepish smile across his face.

"That makes since." There was a long pause between the two. They walked in silence turning at certain corners when they needed to, amazingly, much of their path home was identicle. Then Ivan spoke up again, "So, Alfred is your brother?" He made sure not to ask 'your Alfred's brother?' in feeling that it poke sensitive spot in the boy where people only recognized Alfred and Alfred's brother.

"Y-yeah, we're twins, I guess you could say. But everyone always mistakes me for Alfred," The boy looked down and fixed his eyes onto his feet.

Ivan nodded and looked down to the ground but still kept his head high enough to see when he would need to turn. "Like I did," he said in a calm and somewhat apologetic way, "By the way, I am sorry for that, I didn't mean to get you two mixed up," Ivan apologized smiling his own sheepish smile to the ground.

~owo~

*le perspective change*

Matthew looked up at Ivan, who was still keeping his eyes near the ground. No one had ever really apologized for forgetting or mistaking him for his brother. The only other person to actually do that was Gilbert, and even he wasn't as sincere as Ivan was being right now, even with his sheepish smile across his face. Matthew smiled at Ivan for the apology.

"Thanks Ivan. And it's okay, people get us mixed up all the time, I'm fairly used to it," he replyed still smiling, but looking forward now, that apology had just about made his day.

"You mean to tell me that no one has ever mistaked Alfred for you?" Ivan joked.

"As hard as it is to believe, no one has," Matthew joked along.

Ivan looked up realizing he had to turn there while Matthew continued forward into the strange forested park where he himself needed to go through. Ivan then spoke up, "I'm sorry but I need to turn here to get to my house."

Matthew's smile faded as he saw his new friend heading the other way. He didn't want Ivan to go just yet, it was lonely walking through the forested park on his own so many days; Alfred was either at his football pratice (American) or in detention for his latest prank. He couldn't let his friend leave now, "Hey do you wanna walk through the park with me?" He asked looking back at Ivan, "It gets pretty lonely walking alone and the park isn't too long so it wont add much time to your own walk back to your house," He smiled softly hoping to convince the russian to come this way with him.

"It wouldn't hurt," Ivan shrugged, "I don't need to be immidiatly at home since both my sisters are also busy after school today," he headed towards Matthew who was barely into the park's entrance.

"You have sisters?" Matthew asked.

"Da, I do."

"May I ask what their names are?"

"Da, their names are Katyusha, my older sister, and Natalia, my younger sister," Ivan walked on more and furrowed his eyebrows a bit, "You know, I still don't know your name since I didn't ask for one earlier, but also you never said what it was." Ivan stated this as if it seemed to be more Matthew's fault than his own, he continued asking "A name would really help me out da? So, tell me, what is your name?"

"Hmm? Oh yeah I guess I didn't give you my name, I'm sorry, I figured that you had remember it or something like that since you wanted to walk with me," Matthew grinned akwardly when he realized that he assumed wrong, "My name is Matthew, Matthew Williams," he answered.

Ivan looked as if he had remembered him, just a little though, "Ma-Matte-Matvey."

Matthew frowned slightly at the new nickname given to him, but accepted it none the less, "err.. yeah, that's fine."

"Matvey, da!" Said Matthew's newly found friend.

~oUo~

Author's Note: Whee! Second chapter is out! Oh my gosh, thanks to my two amazing reviewers for their lovely reviews! Mew I is Dinosaur and Valkrie99 cudos and virtual cookies to you! And to all thoes peoples who faved this story or subscribed virtual candy to you (virtual cookies are better, but virtual candy is still good too)! Remember this shiz makes me (the crazy writer) more motivaded, and it lets me know that people are reading this story and that it is good.

Disclaimer: I do not own anything in this fan fiction except for it's very screwed up plot line. Hetalia belongs to Hidekaz Himaruya and all that jazz.

Heights: Yeah, I assumed Russia was the tallest out of all the other countries, since he is the largest out of all countries, so I made him tall. Also I always assumed Canada was fairly tall himself, I know for sure that he's taller than America, it just doesn't always seem like it ovo. So I brought Canada up to Russia's eyes, about 6'2.5" (189.2 cm).

Countries Names (mentioned in this chapter):

Ukraine: Katyusha (Yekaterina) Braginskaya

Belarus: Natalia (Natasha) Arlovskaya

Translations:

(French)

Qui êtes-vous: Who are you

Je peux gérer mes propres problèmes sans votre aide,: I can handle my own problems _without _ your help,

stupide: stupid

Faites glisser l'extrémité arrière il y a: drag your rear end there

Sorry about some of the OOC-ness of Canada, also about switching from french to english in his rant, I always imagined that he would do that though if he were to get angry ewe *shot*. I'm done with my rambling, Thanks For Reading!


	3. Two walks through the Park

As Perusual Meeting You

Chapter 3: Two Walks Through the Park

_Matthew, huh?_ Ivan thought to himself and vaguely remembered in the first day introductions there being a student named Matthew. Though, because he was a quiet student, Ivan took no real interest in the boy. Then somehow Matthew just became invisible in those classes, just another student with no specific quality making himself stand out from others. Now Ivan had somehow become interested, probably from the boy's little fiasco earlier, and from his boldness that he showed before. Ivan wanted to find out the hidden quirks that this generally quiet boy seemed to hold within himself. He took this a new challenge, an 'experiment' as so to say.

So the two walked through the forested park side-by-side, chatting with each other about trivial things. Each trying to learn more about their new friend; so it seemed on the surface.

"So What's it like having Alfred for a brother?" Ivan asked.

"Well," Matthew laughed, "It isn't all rainbows and unicorns; he really is rather a nuisance with his constant pranks and childish behavior. Not to mention his obnoxiously loud voice," Matthew sighed, still with a small smile on his face, "He really is a pain, but he's my brother and I still love him."

"Da, I know what it is like. My sisters can also be a pain, but they are my sisters and I care for them," Ivan agreed.

"Oh yeah your sisters..." Matthew thought to himself for a moment, "Désolé but, what were their names again?" He asked.

"Natalia and Katyusha," Ivan responded.

"Oh yeah, Natalia is the one in lacrosse, exact?"

"Da."

"She's pretty good isn't she?"

"Da. One of the best on the team," Ivan said, a bit of pride entering his voice as continued along the twisting side walk.

"Hmm, and I guess you could say Katyusha is one of my friends, or... something..." Matthew trailed off a bit with his words.

"What do you mean by that?" Ivan asked, he was confused. If he was a friend of Katyusha's surely she would have mentioned him before like she did all her friends. Or he would have sat with them at lunch, sometime. Ivan grimaced slightly at the thought, _Or I may have ignored his sitting there, with the boy's invisibility..._

"Well..." Matthew's voice trailed off even more, "I guess you can call us friends, we've hung out once or twice before... but nothing much really."

"... Do you like her?" Ivan asked bluntly, a small yet intimidating smile grazed his lips.

"Wh-wha? N-non, not like that!" Matthew said blushing and turning away, "I see her as a friend. I'm not all that attracted to her in _that_ way."

"Ok. Because if you did I would need to do extensive research on you to make sure that you would be right for my sister," Ivan looked over Matthew with the same look his eye as Alfred had when he looked Ivan over in the school, yet he had much less hate his eyes than that of Alfred, "Tsk, And I don't think you would been approved."

"Uhh... wha-Hey wait! What are you going on about with that?" Matthew looked at him with a curious and irritated face that questioned Ivan's reasoning behind his statement. Ivan let out a creepy chuckle.

"Oh little Matvey, I was joking with you!" Ivan exclaimed, more creepy chuckles escaping his mouth. Matthew grumbled at the explanation.

"Pssh, some joke," Matthew looked away from Ivan and off through the park woods on his right (Ivan being to his left). He stuffed his hands into his coat pocket with a small huff. The two continued along in some silence.

Ivan looked around at the park; he noted mentally how strange this forested park was. Trees towered over Ivan and Matthew as they walked along the long twisting sidewalk that was covered with colorful autumn leaves; they occasionally swirled in the light wind. Every once in a while they would pass a park bench; nearly all of the benches were empty. In fact, practically the whole park was empty; it was mostly just Ivan and Matthew passing through the park. Yet this made their walk together all the more peaceful.

Ivan brought his eyes to Matthew. The smaller boy was wrapped up in a loose red sweatshirt that made him look like he had more bulk than what was really there. It seemed to keep him warm against the cool wind that played with his hair. Ivan noticed how Matthew's hair had a color that was greatly similar to Alfred's hair. It was a soft dirty blond color, but his seemed to glow more with a smooth golden shine in the warm sunlight. It looked as Matthew took better care of his hair than Alfred ever did, which really wasn't such a surprise since Alfred could quite messy. Also unlike Alfred, Matthew's hair was longer and somewhat wavy. It fell about to the mid-point of his neck and framed his pale, warm face nicely.

As Ivan took in more of Matthew's features he soon realized how much of a difference there was in the two brothers. He then felt stupid for ever mistaking the two for each other (though he only ever mistook Matthew for Alfred.) Soon enough Ivan looked at Matthew's eyes, which had darted their way back to observing Ivan, and saw a very unique color in them that he did not expect to see in the rather unremarkable Canadian. It was something of a deep blue color, yet it had a soft, warmer glow than what would first seem to it, giving the iris color a lighter feel to it. Then there was a ring of purple right next to his pupil, and various other purple flecks that danced around within his irises. And it wasn't the cold, dark amethyst purple like what Ivan had, his eyes that could pierce through anyone, no, these eyes held a warmth to them, the purple was lighter, softer, they had a look of kindness within them.

Matthew turned his head slightly and peeked at Ivan through the corner of his eye. There was something that Matthew's eyes were hiding too. A deep mystery that held some very important information. 'Matvey certainly is a strange boy' Ivan thought to himself. Matthew continued to peek at Ivan through the corner of his eye; there was nothing more than curiosity and amusement in his gaze as it seemed to trace Ivan. _That's weird, _Ivan thought, _Most people look at me with some kind of fear in their eyes, even those who have never met me. But Matvey, there is no fear in his eyes, there's no fear at all... perhaps it is because he simply doesn't know who I really am, he has not seen the me that everyone else sees, perhaps he does not know of my "reputation"... We will have to fix that_.

"Matvey?" Ivan spoke up to break the peaceful yet curious silence between them.

"Hmm?" Matthew looked up at Ivan, a complete calm look in his face, "Oui?" More curiosity laced his expression.

"You know of my 'reputation' at school, da?" Ivan asked this with a childish yet creepy smile crawling across his face. Surely the boy _had _to have some kind of fear for Ivan. Right?

The smile worked, "Well, um... Y-yeah," a bit of fear entered the boy's eyes and his face dropped some of its previous warm, blank expression to be replaced with a tiny, partly disturbed frown. He kept his voice at a confused tone though, "I've heard various bad rumors around about you, and I've seen you beat Gilbert nearly senseless a few times. But what about it?" Matthew asked.

"And after knowing all that you would still agree to hang out with me _willingly?_" Ivan was surely confused, not only had this boy heard the murderous rumors, but he had _seen_ Ivan in the act, "Without any worry that I would hurt you at all?"

"Well... The way that I see it, you only act when provoked. Every time you attacked Gilbert was because he was asking for it. And from all the stories I've heard you never really did those things without a good (-ish) reason. People just assume from those stories that you're the kind of person whom would simply do bad things for no reason," Matthew's expression calmed as he explained more, "As long as I don't go out seeking some kind of reaction from you I have no real reason to be all that afraid," he paused and looked up at Ivan smiling kindly, "And I don't think your all that bad of a person, Ivan."

"W-wha..." Ivan looked at the bold boy in shock, before he could reply Matthew spoke again.

"This is my stop," both boys stopped walking. They had reached the end of the park, and stood along a sidewalk right next to a cross walk that would allow people to cross the street that stretched out in front of the boys. Across the said street sat many houses all lined up with each other, "My house is right there across the street," Matthew pointed towards a warm, sky blue house that sat diagonal from them.

"O-oh," Ivan looked around, confused at the sudden end in the large park. A tall brick wall separated the park from the street and neighborhood before them, a break right where they stood acted as a park entrance, "What street are we on?" He asked while looking to his left and right down the two directions of the street, "I might be able to make my way back to my own house," the park seemed to stretch down both ways the sidewalk slivering next to the tall brick wall.

"Right now we're on Artic Circle (*shot* ewe)," Matthew answered casually.

"...Artic Circle are you sure?"

"Umm, yes this is the street I live on, Artic Circle."

"I live on this street too!" Ivan exclaimed.

"R-really? The how come I haven't seen you around at the park or around the neighborhood?"

"Well I don't go out and visit much with my neighbors, and I haven't really been through that park before," Ivan chuckled, "Interesting, I wouldn't have guessed that we lived so near to each other. Ironic, is it not?" Ivan looked at Matthew with a humorous curiosity.

"Yeah, who would have thought it?*"

Ivan questioned the boy's choice of words, but shrugged it off. He then asked "So, right here, which streets are to my left, and which are to my right?" Ivan pointed in both the directions of his choice.

"Let's see... to our right is E. Kingdom Road," Matthew pointed to the right, "And to our left is Siberian Way. Do you know where you need to go?"

"Da. I just need to head left towards Siberian Way, I live on the corner between the two streets." Ivan looked off to the left, trying to determine how much distance he would have left to walk, "Well, I'll be on my way now. Farewell Matvey, maybe we will see each other sometime soon again." Ivan waved goodbye as he turned his back to Matthew and began to head the rest of his way home.

"Hey Ivan!" Matthew quickly called out to Ivan before he got very far.

"Hmm?" Ivan turned back to face Matthew once again, "What is it?" He asked.

"Well... I was wondering if tomorrow morning you would like to walk to school this way again, you can bring your sisters if you all walk together and of course Alfred will have to walk with all of us too... but that won't be that bad. He's usually uber sleepy on our morning walks to school. Oh! That is, if it's not too much of a bother to you and your sisters!"

"Da, that would be nice," Ivan gave his disturbingly cheery smile before heading off to his house again.

"Ok. See ya then!" Matthew smiled and then waved off as he crossed the street to his house.

~owo~

Thus they parted their ways. Each anticipating meeting up together the next morning, yet both had some sort of doubt building in the back of their minds. _Will he actually come?_

Ivan walked on the sidewalk beside the brick wall that separated the park for him. It was quiet and Ivan was alone with his thoughts. _What a strange boy he was, _Ivan thought, _I've haven't met someone like him before, someone who was able to look at me, know full well who I was and how I've been known to act, and show such little fear to me. Me, the "ferocious" Ivan Braginski! _A darker thought crawled to the front of his mind, _Or maybe, it was an act. Maybe the boy was just acting unafraid. Inside his mind was screaming for him to run for cover, but h-he was dared to do this, yeah! It was just a stupid dare by some of his friends, and he won't show up tomorrow, he was dared to ask me that. His plan was to get my hopes up, and then the next morning he would just ditch me and my sisters._

Ivan wasn't fond of the thought, but a great part of his mind believed it was true. He had really just met the boy and knew little about him, Matthew could easily put on a little act to fool Ivan. _Well I won't let this boy get the upper hand on me! I won't show up next morning! No one can fool Ivan Braginski, no one. _Ivan paused as he reached his house, _That was fast, through the park seems to be a quicker way home from school. _He walked up the steps to his small porch, quickly checking the flowers he and his sisters planted in September. The flowers were beginning to wilt from the oncoming winter season. They had bloomed beautifully in October, their season was ending now, but the seeds will hopefully hold out and replant themselves come next autumn.

Ivan's mind was still on the boy and the trip as he pulled out his house key and began to open the door to his house, _I think I will go through the park with my sisters, not because Matvey offered for me to, but because it will be a quicker way to get to school, _Ivan reassured himself. _Besides, I will have my sisters with me and they are the main company that I need._ Ivan opened the door to his empty house, no one was home. It was just him for now. _I will see every one later. Now I need to see what we have for making dinner tonight._ Ivan set his bag down and walked over to the kitchen. It was his night to cook dinner, but his older sister always planned what they would have for the night. He walked up to the kitchen counter and peered down at the cookbook that was opened and marked at a certain page. _Oh *insert random Russian dish* that will be easy. I can start cooking that in an hour or so. _Ivan went on to work on his homework for the evening, pushing Matthew to the back of his mind for the time being.

His older sister arrived home first about an hour and a quarter after Ivan. She found him already starting on dinner, a blank expression on his face as he –chopped vegetables-. After exchanging hellos in their native language, she headed up to her room, but not without noticing through the stair railing that Ivan was mumbling to himself. It was very quiet and faint, much quieter than when Ivan normally mumbled to himself. When Ivan was barely audible during his mumbling, it usually meant that he was confused, Katyusha shrugged it off as "trouble with homework" and decided that she would help him with it later after dinner. _Little Ivan always looks so cute when he's confused. _She thought to herself with a chuckle.

Next to arrive home was Ivan's little sister, Natalia. With her gear and equipment over one shoulder, and her backpack over the other, she was panting slightly from her lacrosse practice. She turned to the left to see Ivan cooking dinner in the kitchen. Her eyes trailed farther back in the house to see her sister working on homework at the dining table. A call rang through the house; Ivan was too busy to get it and asked Katyusha to. She obliged and went to pick the phone up from a clean kitchen counter. Natalia more or less knew who was on the other line, but when up to her sister out of curiosity anyways. Her sister acknowledged Natalia by setting her hand on Natalia's head, sending her usual sweet smile to Natalia. Natalia returned the smile with one of her own, but it was much a smaller smile, something more common to her. Katyusha began talking with the person on the other side of the phone; Ivan continued cooking, ignoring everything else around him, mostly just the phone though.

"_Yes… Yes I understand, father… ok… see you then…ok, bye father."_ Katyusha said to the other side of the line.

As suspected by the three siblings, it was their father. He was going to be home late… again. Ivan shrugged it off, and Natalia, showed her understanding with a quick nod before heading up to her room to put her things away. Tonight would be just another peaceful night between the three siblings.

Natalia came back down to find her sister setting the dining table and her brother adding the finishing touches to their meal. Dinner was just about ready for them.

"_Natalia, can you get the napkins and silverware for me please?" _Katyusha asked he sister sweetly.

"_Yes sister," _Natalia responded.

They all sat down together, for dinner. All engaging in light conversation, as usual, Ivan said the least, and Katyusha said the most. Ivan's sisters talked of trivial things such as school and their day. Eventually the conversation landed on Katyusha and Natalia feeling sorry for having to let their brother walk home alone like he did today. Ivan told them it was ok and that they shouldn't worry. He decided to leave Matthew out of the conversation because Ivan still had his doubts about the boy. He did mention taking the park path to school.

"_Actually, sisters, on my way home from school I took another way back through a park, and I think it would be a faster way to and from school for us," _Ivan stated.

"_Why did you take another way home brother?" _Natalia asked. It was unusual for Ivan to change from his 'common course' like that.

"…_Someone suggested the way to me," _Ivan responded, his voice and words moving slow.

"_Oh, a friend? Who was it?" _Katyusha asked. Both of Ivan's sisters were well aware that Ivan didn't have many friends, and he usually avoided taking advice or anything like that from others.

"_Just someone from class. He and I have done a project together before, no one really important," _Ivan said. He tried to keep as anonymous as possible; there was no need to get anybody's hopes up. _"But I think we should take the park to school, it w__ould be faster," _Ivan steered the conversation back to the original topic he brought up.

Both his sisters nodded, "_Yes that sounds fine Ivan," _Katyusha told him.

They continued on to have a normal dinner. When dinner was done and cleaned up all of them sat down at the table again to work on whatever homework they each had together. Come later in the evening, the sibling parted their ways to their bedrooms for a goodnight's rest. The next morning they would take the park to school, just as suggested by Ivan.

~owo~

Matthew pulled his keys from his pocket and fumbled with them before jabbing the house key into the keyhole. He twisted the key only to find that his effort was for nothing, the door was already unlocked. _Papa must be home now, _Matthew thought to himself as he pushed through the doorway. Just as the boy presumed, his papa, Francis, was there to greet him.

"Bonjour Matthieu!" Francis said happily engulfing his son in a near bone-crushing hug, "Comment allez-vous?" He asked, releasing his son. Matthew took his papa's French as an obvious note that his dad, Arthur, wasn't home. Arthur didn't like the 'froggy language' as so he called it, so the only time Francis ever spoke it around Arthur was when he wanted to get a rise out of him (which was quite fun to Francis).

"Pas mal," Matthew said with a shrug. He closed the door behind him.

"Où est Alfred?" Francis asked looking behind Matthew.

"Il est en retard," Matthew said matter-of-factly.

"Bien sûr," Francis rolled his eyes at the vague and obvious response from his son. He knew that Alfred didn't have any sports after school so he should have been home with Matthew, "Et pourquoi?" He asked, already having a feeling he would know the answer.

"Détention," Matthew said again looking past his papa, not really wanting to meet his eyes should the boy have to explain _why_ his brother was in detention.

"Bien sûr," Francis said with a sigh. Deciding to leave it at that, His husband would probably get more details from Alfred himself once they were home.

The phone chose then to ring. Francis skipped over to it sitting in the cradle on the kitchen counter. Matthew set his Bag on a stool near the said counter and leaned in to hear who his father was talking to.

"Bonjour, qui est appel?" Francis asked the other end of the line.

"Francis you idiot! Look at the caller I.D. BEFORE you answer the bloody phone! You're in England, meaning the people speak English! I don't want to hear that damn froggy language of yours!" It was Arthur of course. Francis let out a chuckle; it was obvious to Matthew that his papa _did _check the caller I.D. before he picked up the phone.

"Of course, of course. And what might my pleasure be of a call from you ma chérie?" Francis purred into the phone, a smirk ever so present on his face.

"I just wanted to call saying that I'm going to be home early, not much work for us today."

"Good, good. I was wondering if you would like to help me cook dinner tonight," Francis' smirk had faded, and Matthew paled. It was an unspoken rule between Matthew and his papa saying that should Alfred get in trouble, Francis would let Arthur help with that night's meal. Any other time they would try to keep Arthur out of the kitchen no matter what. Alfred was too oblivious to figure out the pattern, but Arthur had recently had his suspicions, of which Francis would tell him it's a mere coincidence.

"…I suppose that sounds fine," Arthur responded with a slight hesitation. No matter though, Arthur always loved to cook for his family, "See you tonight love."

"Au revoir, ma chérie!"

"Yeah, yeah, salut," Arthur mumbled the last part.

"What was that?" Francis asked in a teasing tone, a cocky grin making its way across his face.

*click Booooooooooooooooooop* Francis was met with Arthur hanging up. He and Matthew couldn't help but chuckle.

"_So would you like me to make you something to eat Matthieu_?" (They are speaking French again but I don't know enough to carry all of it out) Francis asked.

"Non merci papa. _I'll just have a plum or something simple for now_," Matthew said heading into the kitchen.

"_Your dad is going to be cooking with me tonight_," Francis reminded his son.

"…_May I have some pancakes papa_?" Matthew asked smiling sweetly, as if his father would refuse.

"_What's the magic word_?" Francis asked with a smile.

"Hmmm… _would it by chance be_ s'il vous plaît?" Matthew said, Francis' smile being mirrored back.

"_Why of course! You can have your plum with them too_," Francis let out a chuckle and went to go get the materials for his 'perfect pancakes'.

Matthew sat at the counter and pulled out some of his homework and began to work on it. Francis hummed a little tune as he cooked. This is how most afternoons without Alfred were, quiet and cheery, without the sound of the television blasting from the living room. "Mrow?" A lean chocolate brown cat jumped up onto the counter to greet Matthew. Matthew smiled and greeted the cat with a scratch behind her ears.

"Why hello there Samira. How are you little kitty?" Matthew asked, stroking the cat as she arched her back. "Mow," she responded. At this Francis whirled around to find Samira on the counter.

"Ahh! Get down from there! The counter is no place for a cat, I don't want you to shed everywhere," Francis said shooing her away. Matthew laughed.

About an hour after pancakes, Arthur arrived home. He was greeted by Francis' over-loving hug, an Matthew at the table working. But there was someone missing… Alfred. Setting down his work bag Arthur was just about to ask where Alfred was when the said boy came bursting through the door.

"The hero is home!" Alfred proclaimed. Francis came and gave him a hug as well and Matthew gave a small wave to his brother.

"Hello Alfred," Arthur said, "Just getting home? I don't remember you having any sports practice today, nor do I recall you mentioning getting together with any friends after school today."

Alfred froze. His father was home before him. It wasn't so bad with just his papa Francis knowing, since he was a bit more flamboyant, but Arthur was much more strict about such things. Alfred looked to Matthew and his papa for some kind of help, and then looked just to his papa considering Matthew probably wouldn't help. Unfortunately for Alfred, Francis just shrugged.

"W-well… you see dad…" Alfred was drawing a blank. Matthew smiled at this; it was an evil shit-eating smile that Alfred only saw from his brother when he received a pleasurable revenge.

"Yes, go on," Arthur said pushing his son along. Alfred let out a sigh.

"I got detention," Alfred looked down as he said it.

"And why is that?" Francis chimed in. At this Matthew frowned and looked away.

"I-um… kinda stoleMattie'sclothesfromhisgymlocker and thenwewentonahighspeedchased ownthehallwayinwhichMattiewa scompletelynaked," Alfred said all in two breaths.

"You WHAT?!" His fathers asked in unison. Francis when over to the somewhat embarrassed Matthew and gave him a hug, "Oh my poor Matthew! Stripped of his clothes unwillingly!" Francis said this in a rather over-dramatic voice, but that was just Francis. Matthew gave a muffled "I'm ok now papa," from Francis' chest.

"Just go to your room," His dad said in a huff, "Work on your homework and don't come down until dinner, understand?" Arthur gave his son a frightening irritated look, "I'll think of a punishment for you later young man."

This is how quite a few nights were for the household, minus the usual bickering of Francis and Arthur. With a huff Alfred pattered upstairs to his room. Arthur went over to Matthew, whom had been released from Francis' tight hug.

"Are you ok lad?" He asked, ruffling Matthew's hair a bit. Francis immediately straitened it back out giving Arthur a look of 'don't touch our magnificent (magical) manes'. Matthew simply nodded.

"Ok then," he said with a smile, "I'll be right back to help you with dinner Francis." Arthur trotted up the stairs leaving Francis and Matthew to share a look of discontent. Oh the night, the night.

Dinner passed normally. Alfred complained about Arthur cooking, which earned him a little smack upside the head, and a short lecture about food quality that no one at the table089 bothered to listen to. Francis and Arthur were now having a rather pissy discussion over something trivial; Alfred adding his two cents in whenever he could, even if it didn't even relate to what his fathers were going on about.

Matthew couldn't bother to listen in on any of them, they were all really stupid some times, and he felt that if he got caught up in it, some of the stupidity would rub off onto him. No, now as he sat at the table, his mind wandered back to Ivan strangely enough. Ivan was… interesting. Certainly a character you wouldn't want to be magical mortal enemies with such as him and Alfred. Matthew had felt that from their encounter, he had found an Ivan that was beyond all the rumors. Sure he was still fairly intimidating, but Matthew, being the optimist he is, felt that there was much more to Ivan, and that little encounter only fed his feelings/suspicions.

Another thought crossed his mind: What if Iva- "Yo Mattie!"

Matthew's head shot up from the palm he had it resting in, "Wh-what?" He was broken out of his trance-like state to meet his fathers and brother giving him concerned or confused looks.

"Elbows off the table," Arthur started, Matthew did as he was told, and Francis continued on, "Are you ok Matthieu?" "Yeah Mattie, you were kinda looking sad there for a bit," Alfred cut in.

"Huh? Oh! No, I-I was just thinking, t-that's all," Matthew said to his family, still dazed.

"What were you thinking about?" Francis asked. Alfred and Arthur watched him for an answer.

"…" Matthew squirmed under all the attention, he wasn't used to this, He wasn't fond of everyone's eyes on him all too much either, "N-nothing, just stuff, a-about school."

Arthur decided to just shrug it off; and Alfred didn't want to continue lest Matthew was thinking about the prank. Francis shot his son another very quick look of concern before continuing with his meal.

After dinner Matthew quickly finished up the rest of his homework. His fathers had decided to settle down for a movie (though it took them a while considering the fact that they both had to agree on a movie). Matthew shuffled upstairs to read without the noises of the said movie bothering him. Oh, and Alfred was still kept in the confines of his room, he was probably (hopefully) working on some of his homework for the night.

Alone in his room, Matthew's mind began to wander away from his book as he thought back to Ivan. His eyes went on auto-pilot with reading while his mind thought. Ivan, he seemed like a trustworthy person, but it still seemed like they weren't quite friends. There would need to be more time before the feeling is mutual. His previous thought from the dinner table came back, _What if Ivan forgets to take the parkway? …What if Ivan forgets him?_ It had happened before, Matthew was a well forgotten person, that or mistaken. Ivan had thought he was Alfred previous… _I shouldn't count on it; this will probably end up like the other times. He'll probably won't come because he will forget tomorrow. Then what? I would have gotten my hopes up for nothing. I shouldn't count on it; he won't be there. _Matthew shook himself from his thoughts when he was about to turn the page in his book. He had no idea what he had just read the last page. "Zut alors, I did it again."

~owo~

Matthew woke up in his bed with his book resting on his chest. He smiled remembering the (rare) quiet night of reading he got yesterday. He stretched and looked at his clock _5:59-_Beep Beep Beep! Matthew clumsily brought his hand on the noisy machine and heaved himself out of his bed. 6:00 am, he needed to go to get a quick shower before his fathers stole all the hot water. Rubbing his eyes Matthew clambered over to the bathroom.

After that he was dressed and came down to Francis cooking a delicious breakfast as usual.

"Morning papa," Matthew said getting out a cup of milk

"Good morning Matthieu," he replied with a smile to his son.

Matthew sat down as Arthur came down stairs shrugging on his jacket. Arthur and Francis exchanged good mornings. Arthur grabbed one of the freshly baked muffins, made by Francis none other, and with a quick kiss, left to work. Francis set down a plate piled with the wonders of breakfast for Matthew. Matthew happily ate the food with his papa at the table. A few minutes later Alfred loudly stumbled down the stairs, half dressed.

"Morn- oh crap!" Alfred yelled before running upstairs. Obvious that he had forgotten something.

Matthew finished his breakfast, stood up grabbing his backpack, and headed for the door. Francis gave him a quick kiss on the forehead.

"À plus tard," Francis said to his leaving son.

"À tout à l'heure," Matthew said leaving out the door.

The brisk wind flew into Matthew's face and whirled around bringing his hair in front of his eyes. He walked down the familiar stairway on his front porch pushing his hair out of the way. He rubbed his eyes and looked across the street to see a peculiar sight near the park entrance. It was Ivan and his two sisters all walking together.

_He remembered? _Was Matthew's first thought. He was shocked. Though the thought was quickly thrown out of his mind as he near ran across the street. "Ivan!" Matthew called across the way. Three heads all turned his way just as they were about to enter the park. Ivan looked shocked, Katyusha was confused, and Natalya? Well Natalya kept a straight face but her eyes were glued to Matthew. Matthew trotted right up to the three siblings. "Hello Ivan!" Matthew said in a rather cheery voice, though it was still quiet.

Ivan still looked shocked and his mouth gaped a bit. Matthew smiled. The four of them stood in a bit of silence before Katyusha spoke up.

"Alfred?" She asked.

Matthew's expression dropped a bit from hearing this, but he kindly corrected her, "Ah, no I'm Matthew, hehe, remember?"

Katyusha looked him over for a moment before her face lit up, "Matvey!" She said jumping over and hugging him.

"Ehe, hi Kat," He said softly in her tight hug.

"Oh! Matvey I'm so sorry for mistaking you for your brother!" Katyusha frowned.

"Oh, no, no it's okay!" Matthew reassured her.

Katyusha offered a weak smile to him. At this Ivan decided to speak up.

"Matvey?" He asked. Ivan had gotten rid of all expectations that the boy would actually arrive.

"Good Morning Ivan. How are you?" Matthew said with a polite smile. Natalya's eyes were still glued to the strange boy that her siblings knew, "Oh! And you must be Natalya, It's nice to meet you," Matthew offered his hand to the figure that was latched onto Ivan's left arm.

Natalya didn't move. She looked from his hand to Matthew's eyes. He offered a small smile, but she still did nothing. After a bit of silence Katyusha spoke up.

"Natalya here is rather shy to new people. But she very open once you get to know her," Katyusha informed Matthew.

"Ah, I see," Matthew said putting his hand down.

"Speaking of siblings," Ivan broke in, "Where is your annoying one?" He asked.

Matthew gave a light chuckle. He didn't respond but instead brought his hand up and began counting down from five on his fingers. Five… four… three… two… one.

Once Matthew held up nothing but a fist, Alfred came bursting from his house across the street. A piece of toast hung from his mouth, he was desperately trying to put his jacket on, inside out, and his backpack was lazily slung over one shoulder wide open, "Yo Mattie wait up!" he called to Matthew.

Matthew turned around to his brother, the said brother ran across the street and nearly got hit by a car. Luckily the car swerved in time as Alfred danced out of it's way. "WHHHHAAAAAA!" Alfred screamed. Amazingly enough, the car managed to come out unharmed. As for Alfred, he was fine too, just shaken up on the sidewalk.

"…Smooth," Matthew said to his brother.

Ivan let out a light creepy chuckle, Alfred looked up at him, "Whaddaya looking at?" He said puffing up his chest, "Ya-" Alfred stopped. He suddenly took into notice the two fabulous females in front of him. One of them, a worried, busty girl with short platinum blond hair standing right next to Matthew, and the other, clinging to Ivan's arm, glaring at Alfred, now she was a beauty. Quickly Alfred brought himself together, "Why hello ladies," He said ever so smooth-like, "And what might the pleasure be that I meet you to here?"

They both look at him strangely, Ivan glared, and Matthew sighed. Katyusha decided to answer him, "We were just heading to school Alfred."

"So I suggest we get moving so that we are not late," Ivan said.

"Oh, why of course!" Alfred said and took a few steps forward into the park, everyone followed behind him. Alfred then swung around and walked backwards while holding out his hand, "I'm Alfred, nice to meet you!" Alfred then proceeded to smile his 100 watt smile.

"I am Katyusha," Katyusha took his hand politely and shook it with a sweet smile.

"And who might you be my dear?" Alfred then asked Natalia, bringing his hand over to her.

"…" Natalia simply stared at the hand then looked up at Alfred, she stayed silent.

The same explanation about Natalia's shyness that was given to Matthew was given to Alfred, "oh, I understand…ish." he said. Alfred then spun around and continued to walk forward through the park ahead of the others, a skip in his step and a dopy, yet tired, smile on his face. It was still too early to be quite so energetic.

Katyusha turned to Matthew and Ivan walking side by side, "So Matvey, Ivan, Are you two friends? How is it that you know each other? It's nice to see Ivan get along with someone and make some more friends! How long have you known each other? Do you have any funny stories to share? How did you two meet?" She bombarded them with question after question, both boys were walking and looking at her with nervous faces, "Oh, I am sorry, I did not mean to ramble on," She apologized once she had realized what she was doing.

"O-oh that's okay, I tend to ramble on myself," Matthew said shaking off the shock of the many questions directed his and Ivan's way. Matthew then went on to answer each of her questions, "Yes we are friends. We know each other because we have a couple of classes together. Yes, that is nice to see. We have known each other for about two months, but really where we have been friends it has only been about a day. No, we don't have any funny stories to share, maybe some other day. We officially met yesterday when I accidentally ran into him walking out of the office," Each question was answered one by one quickly and in Matthew's quiet voice. Ivan looked over at the boy, he felt a bit of happiness burst within him after hearing Matthew say that they were friends, Ivan wasn't too sure what he was going to say to Katyusha's questions.

As they exited the park and continued on their way Katyusha and Matthew continued to chat before Alfred decided to break in and "steal" her away as his own chatting partner. Matthew sighed but continued walking along next to Ivan. The two boys struck up some conversation from whatever it was that they were talking about before. The whole time Natalya held onto Ivan's and said nothing. Most of the time she kept he eyes glued to Alfred, but she was more glaring at him as opposed to staring.

_Friends, _Ivan thought to himself, _Yes that sounds nice._

~OwO~

A/N: YES! Finally done! I'm not dead! I am sooo sorry for taking two and a half months to finish this! Especially when I said I'd have it in a week. Auuugh! But lucky for you readers this chapter is rather long, near 14 pages on Microsoft word! I love all of my readers and followers and you fantastic reviewers! Oh and Samria the cat is Neko!Sheyshelles (spelling?). For any grammar mistakes I'm sorry, I will probably look over this and fix my grammar mistakes later.

Translations:

Pourquoi: why

Comment allez-vous?: How are you?

Pas mal: not bad

Il est en retard: He's late

Où est: where is

Bien sûr: of course.

détention: detention

et Pourquoi: and why

Appel: calling

Zut alors: Darn it

Any French that was said but not included in this translation, I'm sorry; I won't put it in there. If you want to know what it means just pm me asking and I will tell you. Ja, all of that was NOT put into Google translate, I used my knowledge of the magical French language! Thanks to my awesome French class! Hoorah!

Anyone know what AU means? I think this might be an AU. Also any suggestion for a human name for Cuba? I need him for a later scene. Ok! I'm done, ze next chapter is being written!

owo~ InkFlow


	4. THE GAAAAAP!

As Perusual Meeting You

Chapter 4: THE GAP!

A/N: Yeah I added a LOT of little comments or snippets in the horrible chapter, Don't mind them.

Over the next week Ivan and Matthew got to know each other quite well. During art they would sit together and work while casually chatting. Every morning the five would walk to school and sometimes all walk back together. Though Alfred and Natalya often had sports and Katyusha had her club or something along the lines After school; so Matthew and Ivan would just walk home together. Ivan enjoyed the new company; it was pleasant compared to everyone always trying to avoid him. Matthew was also fond of all the new attention he was receiving, though it still seemed a little odd to him. It was a wonderful feeling of friendship. (OHH The Friendship!)

On Friday, Matthew figured out where Ivan often went to sit for lunch. Matthew invited Ivan to sit with him. Ivan agreed. Matthew couldn't help but notice the quick, dirty glare Natalya sent his way… odd. Matthew simply shrugged it off and led Ivan to the table with Matthew's only other friends, Lovino, Yorrick, and Gilbert (whoosh!).

The table wasn't too crowded, but still buzzing with the voices of noisy students. Matthew sat left of Lovino, with Yorrick sitting across the way. Lovino sat next to and chatted with his friend Antonio, who sat next to Gilbert, who loudly and cheerfully chatted with Alfred sitting across the way. Ivan sat on the left side of Matthew and began to pull out the marvelous lunch his older sister had packed for him. Lovino turned to say hi to 'Matteo', but immediately noticed the more dangerous figure behind friendly boy.

Lovino froze. What was Ivan doing sitting here, he thought, And right next to Matteo! He is talking to Ivan too! This isn't good. I've got to warn Matteo before he gets hurt by the brute. Lovino tapped Matthew on the shoulder to get his attention away from Ivan.

"Hold on a moment Ivan," Matthew told the man. He turned around to Lovino, "Yes Lovino?" Matthew asked in a calm, sweet whisper.

Lovino talked to him in Italian, knowing Matthew would understand but hopefully Ivan wouldn't, "_What are you doing talking to HIM_?" Lovino asked.

Matthew responded in French, knowing Lovino would understand and wanted to keep this fairly secret from others sitting around, "_What do you mean_?" Matthew replied, though he already had a feeling he knew what this was about.

"_What are you doing casually sitting and chatting with Ivan Braginski? The scariest kid in school!_" Lovino, like many other students, was frightened of Ivan and knew all too well of the tall boy's reputation.

Ivan perked up at hearing his name come from Italian. Though he couldn't really understand them; he only knew a smidgen of French, but not a lick of Italian. (pardon my saying)

"_He is just a friend, Lovino. Don't worry about it_," Matthew responded trying brush it off.

"…_Just a friend? How can you be friends with someone like him_?" Lovino asked, he simply couldn't believe it, "_Especially someone like you, mister 'peacemaker_?'"

"_Now what earth do you mean by that?" _Matthew huffed. He was starting to get irritated with Lovino (DUN DUN DUUUUUUUN!).

"_What I mean is you're an overly kind person who doesn't like violence_-"

"_Unless it's in hockey_." Matthew budged in.

"_Shut up I wasn't finished_," Lovino shot back, "_Anyways I'm more worried if he will hurt one of us. I don't want me of any of my friends getting hurt_." (Lovino CARES! =w=)

"_He's has already hurt Gilbert plenty of times though_," Matthew pointed out.

"_Yeah but nobody cares about Gilbert_," Lovino quickly added after.

"…" There was a pause between the boys before both of them burst out laughing.

"Ha aha ha!" Gilbert jumped over to the other two and popped his head in.

"I heard my name," He said, "What are you two talking about?"

"Heh heh, whoo…" the other two calmed their laughing fit down before Lovino answered him, "Nothing wise o' dumb one."

"Hey! Who do you think you are calling someone as awesome as I dumb?" Gilbert near growled at Lovino.

_I love how he doesn't even recognize the oxymoron_, Matthew gave another chuckle before turning his attention back to Ivan and letting his other two friends fight it out. He was met with Ivan giving him and the others odd looks. Matthew smiled, "Oh, don't mind us hehe."

"…Um," Ivan Gave another weird look to them before asking, "So what were you and Lovino talking about? I believe I heard my name, da?"

"Oh don't worry about it, Lovino was just being a little paranoid, but I don't think it will come up again," Matthew said, reassuring Ivan.

Flick. "Or maybe you're just being too nonchalant," Lovino cracked in quickly from his fight with Gilbert, flicking the back of Matthew's head.

Matthew just ignored it and continued conversing with Ivan, "Yeah, my other friends are kind of dicks…"

"Da, I'm all too aware," Ivan agreed. Matthew let out another chuckle.

"But don't forget about me now," Another voice pryed in.

"Oh, yes, there is you to," Matthew said looking over to Yorrick.

Ivan looked up to see Yorrick sitting across from them. He sat slouched over holding some kind of foreign food in his hands. Yorrick's hair stood up in the oddest fashion, and he peered at Ivan with a blank look in his green eyes. A small scar sat above his right eye but he didn't seem to mind. The man was silent as he took a bite from his food, eyes never leaving Ivan's. Ivan returned the look with a much more curious one, his eyebrow high on his forehead. As Yorrick swallowed Matthew decided to introduce the two.

"Oh Ivan this is my friend Yorrick, he's from the Netherlands. Yorrick, this is my friend Ivan," Matthew said politely.

Yorrick held out his hand and calmly said, "Nice to meet you,"

Ivan awkwardly returned the gesture.

Matthew chuckled, "You're a bit of a dick too, Yorrick," he said.

"Yes, but we are men. And it is simply in our nature," Yorrick joked. (I feel rather sexist writing that...)

Both Ivan and Matthew laughed at this. At that end of the table the air was friendly, but behind then Lovino and Gilbert's fight had gotten a bit more violent.

WHUMP!

Ivan's eyes went wide as Matthew was suddenly squished under the weight of Gilbert and Lovino. Matthew was bent far forward with his head nearly in his lap; Lovino's back was against Matthew's as Gilbert was being held above by the neck. The two rowdy boys only had a second on top of Matthew before he shoved the two of them off with a strength that Ivan didn't know the boy had. Matthew turned around towards them just to watch Gilbert and Lovino fall all over Antonio. This caused Alfred to jump up in an attempt to "help" but all that broke out was a lot of shouting and whatnot.

Soon enough Feliks the hall monitor was seen heading towards the fight in his usual bright pink vest. An ugly scowl sat on his face.

"Alright you guys, break it up!" He shouted. Feliks wrenched both of his arms in between Lovino and Gilbert in the midst of strangling each other. Swiftly Feliks opened his arms to spread the two apart and brought his hands up to pinch both of their ears.

Lovino yelped at the sudden pain in his ear whereas Gilbert made more of a hissing sound.

"Everybody shut up and calm down!" Feliks shouted through the crowd. The other students who sat at the table settled down a bit, "Alright you two," he hissed at Lovino and Gilbert, "We're taking a 'trip' down to the office."

Before leaving Feliks gave a quick glare over to Ivan, "I'm watching you," he said with a glare before dragging Lovino and Gilbert off by their ears.

Ivan raised his eyebrows in a mock shocked expression.

"...What was that about Ivan?" Matthew asked.

Ivan chuckled, "Feliks does not like me. He often blames me for most everything, even without any good evidence. Foolish." (Feliks has Polish issues)

Matthew gave Ivan a weird look before deciding to drop it a continue eating. Ivan and Yorick did the same. The rest of the meal was calm and normal. (THE BORING GAP)

~OwO~

AUTHORS NOTE: I AM TERRIBLY SORRY FOR MAKING YOU WAIT SO LONG FOR SUCH A SHORT AND RATHER UNEVENTFUL CHAPTER! Really, I am. It's just that most all of the story is written out in my head, but this is where I didn't really have the story written out. so there was a gap. I didn't want to do a two week gap though, and I felt I needed to present how Ivan and Matthew's relationship is at this point. Next chapter will be better though (I hope!) and more relationship building will happen. Not to mention I'm bringing Cuba in this, so you know shit's going to happen. Again terribly sorry for the chapter wait. (As is I've had a crap-load of homework and my mother has banned me from working on my stories until the end of the semester, HA!)

No translations, because no foreign language written out. (lazy)

Also Yorrick is Netherlands, I liked the name.

Thank you for reading! Nag me on how I can improve using the magical review!


	5. WHAM! You Motherly Asshole!

As Perusual Meeting You

By: InkFlow

Chapter 5: WHAM! You Motherly Asshole!

It had been near two and a half weeks from Matthew and Alfred's "naked incident" and when Ivan and Matthew had officially met. Once again Ivan and Matthew are sitting together at lunch; it had become a regular for them now. They were having a nice conversation about food and whatnot.

All the while Matthew had a sneaking suspicion in the back of his mind that something bad was going to happen. It started at the beginning of lunch and hasn't left yet.

WHAM!

"HA! Stupid American. This is what you get when you mess with Carlos Jose-Fernando-Alberto-Maria-Juan! Don't let it happen again Alfred."

Oh there it was.

That had been none other than Carlos, a boy from Cuba, and the only enemy of Alfred that ever managed to injure Matthew in his process of getting whatever revenge he wanted on Alfred. Matthew would try to tell Carlos that he wasn't Alfred, and when Carlos would listen, he always apologised, but usually forgot a few days later. Matthew could understand once, many people did that, but never multiple time. He was beginning to grow weary of Carlos' forgetful (or just stupid) wrath.

Matthew cringed; he was covered in Carlos' leftovers from lunch, oh joyous. There was absolute silence at the table. Everyone was still. Though before Alfred could get out a word to his brother, Matthew stood up and exited the cafeteria in a silent huff.

Instantly Alfred stood and went chasing after Matthew, "Mattie! Wait up! Are you ok?!" Alfred's voice faded off as he exited the cafeteria himself.

There was another moment of silence before people continued to have their lunch, hoping that the problem would solve itself. Few noticed Ivan get up and head for Carlos, and even less noticed Natalia get up a bit later to follow him.

~ To Matthew!~

Matthew gave a little hiccup as he stormed off into the hallway. He could feel small tears begin to prickle his eyes as he passed through the hall but held them back. The hallway may have looked deserted, but there may have been some other students somewhere, Matthew couldn't cry in front of them, that would just be worse. Immediately Matthew made a left into the boys bathroom where he could be alone and clean himself up. Luckily for him no one else was in the bathroom. Behind Matthew could hear his brother calling for him.

Matthew took a moment to breath before he grabbed some paper towels to wipe his face of the tears that began to escape his eyes. He rubbed furiously at them before stopping to take a deep breath. As he exhaled Alfred entered the bathroom.

"Hey Mattie, a-are you okay?" Alfred asked quietly as he approached his brother.

Matthew drew in another shaky breath before he answered Alfred, "I-I'm fine Alfred," he said in a near whisper.

"Ya sure? I could help an-"

"Nono. I-I'm okay. I don't need any h-help Alfred," Matthew's voice quivered, "Please, just go, I-I can handle myself."

"O-okay, if you insist Mattie," Alfred said, worry still preeminent in his voice, "If you don't come back before the end of lunch I'll get your stuff for you," And Alfred went back into the hallways.

"Thanks Al," Matthew gave his brother a small smile before he was left alone in the bathroom.

Matthew grabbed some more paper towels and began to clean the rest of Carlos' lunch off of himself. The said leftovers consisted of mashed potatoes, ice cream, and milk, all those sticky, messy things.

~owo~

"OW! Let go you ass! Where the hell are you taking me?!" Carlos yelled.

Ivan was currently dragging Carlos by the ear through the hallways. Wrenching Carlos in front of him, Ivan stops moving.

"Nyet, I will not let go. I am taking you to apologise to Matthew Williams," Ivan growled. He continued searching the halls for Matthew.

"Matthew Williams? What the hell did I do the him?" Carlos asked.

Ivan swung Carlos around to face him again. A deep scowl spread across Ivan's face as he glared straight into Carlos' eyes.

"What did you do to him?" Ivan growled, "What did you do?" He repeated, "Think back to just a moment ago in the cafeteria when you 'pleasantly' dumped your lunch on top of him," Ivan told Carlos dryly.

"Agh," Ivan was squeezing harder on Carlos' ear, "What are you talking about? That was Alfred," Carlos said, desperately trying to g himself out of this situation.

"No, that was Matthew, Alfred's brother" Ivan began to move forward again, "And you are going to apologise to him," Ivan ended it at that leaving no room for more argument.

At that moment Alfred came out of the nearby boys bathroom looking somewhat glum. He looked over at Ivan and Carlos, immediately taking note of their position. It was somewhat amusing to him, seeing Carlos struggle like that.

"What are you doing with him?" Alfred asked Ivan.

"I am taking him to apologise to Matvey," Ivan answered.

"...I see... Carry on then, I guess," Alfred left it at that before heading off.

Ivan gave a nod of his head before entering the bathroom Ivan assumed Matthew was in. His assumption was right; there in the bathroom was Matthew half sitting on the sink counter, half standing and gingerly dabbing at a stain on his shirt. He was still fairly dirty, food stuck to his hair, cheek, and various parts of his shirt. His face held no emotion with his actions until he looked up at the two. Shock overtook his expression as he observed the precarious sight before him.

Ivan pulled Carlos' ear once more before shoving him forward. Carlos stumbled forward but caught himself on the counter, using it to stable himself and stand up straight.

"Now apologise," Ivan commanded as he crossed his arms and glared daggers into the back of Carlos' head.

"I-I'm-" Carlos stuttered, "I'm sorry for mistaking you for your brother and hurting you again."

Again?! Ivan shouted in his head. Once Ivan could understand, he had done so himself, but multiple time was a shame.

"..." There was a pause of silence before Matthew responded, "Apology accepted.

"Now leave," Ivan spoke leaving no room for more conversation.

Carlos skittered out of the bathroom as fast as he could. Once he was gone, Ivan and Matthew were left alone. Matthew's eyes were still wide as he looked over and up to Ivan. Ivan's face quickly softened from the hard glare he had directed at Carlos.

"W-wha-"

"Are you okay Matvey?" Ivan quickly asked. Concern obvious in his voice as he inspected Matthew.

"Uh... Yes I'm fine Ivan" Matthew reassured his friend. He looked down towards the floor in embarrassment.

"Here," Ivan grabbed some more paper towels and dampened them in some warm water, "Let me help."

"N-no no. That's okay Ivan. I can take care of this on my own," Matthew insisted trying to make Ivan leave.

"You know I'm going to help you whether you like it or not, right?" Ivan stated bluntly. He began to wipe a bit of ice cream off of Matthew's left cheek.

Matthew's face brightened to a light red from embarrassment, "I-I had a feeling," He said before continuing to wipe at his shirt.

They heard a thump outside of the bathroom door, it was quickly followed by a few other thumps. Both boys stopped. No more noises were heard so they decided to ignore it and continue cleaning up Matthew.

"You know, when you act like this, you're kind of acting rather motherly Ivan," Matthew commented.

Ivan stopped scrubbing and narrowed his eyes, his lips were pressed together into a thin line. Matthew met Ivan's gaze with his own innocent one. There was a moment of stillness between them as both boys looked each other over.

"..." Ivan then broke the stillness and began to scrub at Matthew's face again but this time harder, "I was raised by Katyusha most of my life what do you expect?" Ivan quickly said, extreme concentration and irritation spread across his own face.

Matthew smiled and let out a light chuckle before continuing to clean off his shirt. A comfortable silence settling between the two boys.

After a few more minutes of cleaning, of which conveniently no other boys strode into the bathroom, Matthew was finally rid of most of Carlos' lunch.

"Thank you Ivan. F-for helping me. You really didn't have to," Matthew told his friend shyly. He looked down as the two exited the boys bathroom.

"It was no problem. I wanted to help Matvey," Ivan looked down on Matthew smiled, a real genuine smile.

They started heading in the direction of the cafeteria, hoping to finish up whatever lunch they left behind. The two didn't get too far before a groan was heard to their left. Both boys turned their heads to see Carlos trying to get up, but having some difficulty. There were bruises on his arms and a few on his face. There were even a few scratches on him here and there.

"It looks like Alfred got you," Matthew commented with a flat tone.

Carlos lifted his head up to the two in front of him. Ivan noticed the scratches on Carlos' arms and one on his cheek.

"It looks like my sister got you too, for some odd reason," Ivan said.

Carlos grunted in response and finally got up on his own. He headed down towards the hallway Ivan had originally dragged him from.

Ivan and Matthew left Carlos on his own and continued their way to the cafeteria. There, they were greeted by worried friends.

"Matthew are you okay?" "Did it hurt?" What a dick-ish thing for Carlos to do!" Matthew politely answered the questions and reassured everyone he was okay. He headed back to the table he had originally left with Ivan following behind him.

Though they did not see what they expected to see at their table. Before them was a rather strange sight. Alfred sat at the table with Natalia fussing over him. A black eye was beginning to show on Alfred's face.

"You have a black eye, you need to go to the clinic," Natalia told Alfred in a monotone voice.

"Nah it's fine," Alfred said, "I've had them before, I can deal with this later."

"No, it is starting to swell. I have delt with black eyes before Alfred," she countered, irritation entering her voice.

"The swelling will go down, Nat," Alfred told Natalia, brushing her annoyance off, "Don't worry about it."

"Alfred if you do not go down to the clinic and let me help you injury, so help me, I will give you another black eye!" Natalia shouted.

"Woah, woah. Calm down Nat," Alfred said, bringing his hands up in a mock surrender.

"And do not call me NAT!" Natalia stormed off back to her sister's table mumbling to herself in her native tongue.

"That was smooth," Matthew said walking up to his brother.

"Totally man," Alfred rubbed his neck sheepishly, "At least I don't have a black eye from her too."

"Oh trust me, she will get you later," Ivan said smiling creepily.

"Er-" RIIIIIIIIIIING!

Everyone began to rush off and fill the hallways at the sound of the bell. Ivan and Matthew gathered their left behind things before splitting paths to their separate classes.

~owo~

It was now nearing the end of the last class of the day for Ivan and Matthew. They sat together in their shared art class as Tino, the cheerful Finnish kid Matthew usually sat by before he began to sit with Ivan, finished his presentation of the classes most recent project. As Tino finished his presentation and went to sit down, the teacher took her opportunity to stand up and address the class.

"Class, I know you just finished one project, but I want to give another project to all of you today before the end of class," Mr. Vargas told the class. Each of the students leaned forward in anticipation, "This project will be a partner project and I am allowing you to choose your partners!" Murmurs spread throughout the room between students, many already choosing their partners, "Alright, alright, quiet down. Now unfortunately students I cannot give you time to work on this in class so you will have to work with you partners afterschool," more quiet chittering was spoken between students as Mr. Vargas explained the project to the students.

The art class was to create a portrait of their partners using a medium of their choice. The portrait was supposed to have a facial image of the person, but also something that more represents the student, such as a signature to them.

"Now please come up to the front desk and write down your partners on the paper as you leave," Mr. Vargas placed the sign up sheet on the front desk. The bell rang and students scurried forward to sign up and for a quick escape.

Matthew turned to Ivan and smiled, "Would you like to be my partner Ivan?" He asked politely.

"Matvey, there is no need to ask, of course I will be your partner!" Ivan answered cheerfully.

"Oh I just wanted to check, no need to assume," Matthew said as he headed towards the front of the room, Ivan following right behind him.

A small line came from the front table, but soon enough Ivan and Matthew were at the front of the room. Matthew quickly scribbled down his and Ivan's names on the paper right next to each other. They then headed out the classroom to the front doors of the school both boys ready to meet up with Katyusha for their walk home together. Today was a Wednesday so both Alfred and Natalia had sports practice after school. So it would just be Matthew, Ivan and Katyusha to walk home together today.

"Ivan I have an idea," Matthew said as the two boys moved through the crowded hallways, "For our project, you could come to my house on Friday and then stay the night! How does that sound?" He proposed.

"..." Ivan thought for a moment, "Da, that sounds nice Matvey," he replied.

"Wonderful! I'll have to check with my parents though to see if it's fine with them," Matthew said,

Ivan simply nodded. Excitement built up in his chest at the thought of actually going to another friend's house, he had never really done that before, though he had never really gotten the chance to be good friends with someone before.

The two boys met up with Katyusha and they all walked home together.

Truly the friendship is blooming.

~oUo~

Author's Note: Oh god... this chapter. Now I intended for this chapter to be a bit longer but I decided to cut the next scene and put it into the next chapter. Hooray for updates though! That whole scene in the bathroom I came up with over a month ago while I was doing dishes, that's when I write the most scenes out in my head.

Translations: None as far as I'm concerned, I'm still only learning French.

Mr. Vargas is Grandpa Rome for those who were not sure. And Carlos Jose-Fernando-Alberto-Maria-Juan is Cuba, I took both suggestions thank you wonderful reviewers!

Disclaimer: I do not own Hetalia, just the very screwed up plotline. Hetalia belongs to Hidekaze Himayura and all that jazz. (I forgot that last chapter)

Thank you for reading this! I have a horrid love/hate relationship with this story and usually wins forcing me to write but then after the chapter is posted the hate takes over. I love my readers and reviewers, tell me what you HONESTLY think of... this.

owo~ InkFlow


	6. So Many Years to Home

As Perusual Meeting You

By: InkFlow

Chapter 6: So many years to Home

Matthew sat at the dinner table with his father and papa. Alfred was currently out at his football (American) practice still, his practices usually lasted quite long after school. The table was mostly in silence as they ate, with the occasional clink of silverware.

"So 'ow was school today Mathieu?" Francis asked Matthew.

"Hmm? Oh it was fine papa," Matthew said ignoring the day's lunch events, "In fact we started another project in our art class."

Francis smiled, "Oh? And what project is this?" Arthur asked.

"Actually it is a partner project," Matthew answered, "I partnered up with one of my friends in the class and was wondering if he could come over to our house this Friday and stay the night. If that's ok with you."

"Hmm, do we know zis friend of yours," Francis asked.

"Non, I met him about two and a half weeks ago," Matthew answered.

"What is his name?" Arthur asked, taking a drink.

"His name is Ivan Braginski," Matthew said with a smile.

Arthur and Francis stopped, eyes widening in shock. Arthur, having been taking a drink, choked a bit on his drink and began to cough furiously.

"Dad! Are you okay?!" Matthew exclaimed.

Arthur coughed for another minute or so, Francis rubbing his back to calm him. There was a moment of pause as Arthur took a deep breath. The breath came out rather shaky but Arthur seemed to pay it no mind as he took a drink of his water. He let out another breath, this one not as shaky, before Francis spoke.

"Are you okay, Arthur?" He asked hand still on his husband's back.

"Yes, thank you, I'm fine," Arthur reassured them, "What did you say your friend's name was Matthew?" Arthur continued.

"U-uh, Ivan Braginski," He answered, still worried for his father.

Arthur and Francis sat up straight and shared a look of... worry, was it? Matthew wasn't quite sure, there were too many expressions mixed into one with their looks, but it was a knowing look between the two, that was for sure. This made Matthew curious.

"Um, m-may I ask what that look was about? D-do you two know him?" Mathew asked his fathers.

"No, we do not know him, but we do know his father Mr. Winter," Arthur told Matthew with a less mixed expression.

"..." It was Matthew's to look a little shocked, "I assure you that however mister Winter is, Ivan is a good person."

Francis and Arthur smiled and shared another quick glance of joy to each other.

"We know Mathieu," Francis said, "You are a good judge of character."

~owo~

Alfred had arrived home towards the end of their family meal after Matthew has gotten his answer that yes, Ivan could come over this Friday. It was now just before everyone would typically head off to bed, Matthew was in his room reading and Alfred was down in the living room working on his homework. Francis and Arthur currently sat up in their shared bedroom and were talking. They spoke quietly to each other as both men mulled over their topic of conversation.

"Its been so long, hasn't it?" Arthur said.

"Oui. 'ow old is Alfred now?" Francis asked.

"About 17 years now I believe," Arthur answered.

"My, it 'as been zat long," Francis looked down, he chuckled, "I feel quite old now. Don't you?"

"Yes, very old," Arthur answered, "Matthew said he met Ivan about two weeks ago, correct?"

"Oui, and according to your spell?"

"That leaves us with about two weeks and a month,"

"... My, zat is not much time left. Are you really ready to go back 'ome?"

"I've been ready for a while now," Arthur told Francis, his voice quiet as he spoke, "We at least have those two months and a week to brush up on the boys training. I think both of them will get some time to train again this weekend."

"Are you sure Matthieu will be ready?" Francis asked, worry obvious in the air around him.

"This is what we have been working on for 14 years now," Arthur said, trying to reassure his husband, yet terribly worried himself.

"Yes, but she-"

"I know, but we can't change this, we knew it was going to come sooner than later. It is inevitable," Arthur left the conversation at that before shuffling off to change into his jams.

Francis slipped under the covers and shimmied out of his clothes, pushing them at the end of his bed under the covers to keep his toes warm. He let out a yawn as Arthur came back in his jams. Arthur climbed into bed with Francis as he turned out the lights in their room. Arthur wiggled closer to Francis in the bed, Francis snuggled close to Arthur and wrapped his arm around the other. He planted a kiss on Arthur's cheek.

"Good night, mon cher. Soon enough we will return home," Francis whispered.

If it even still is our home when we return. Arthur thought to himself.

~owo~

Matthew yawned as he closed his book he'd been reading, having just finished a chapter. He looked at his clock, 10:15 pm, Matthew decided it was late enough and got ready for bed. After a few minutes, he was just about ready to climb into bed. Matthew looked over at his calendar.

"Hmm. Looks like I'm going to visit Carive tonight," He said before climbing into his bed and falling asleep.

~oUo~

Author Note: I totally just fucked you up with that scene between Arthur and Francis didn't I? Hahaha! Yes so, lucky you guys! Two chapters in only three days! Wow! So last night I neglected my homework to write this on a sudden burst of inspiration! I never knew I had it in me! Though both are chapters are rather short... Whatever.

I give you my readers some FrUKing fluff! I feel like they don't always bicker. As I wrote this, I just began to write them as if they were my own parents, so they functioned in a much similar way.

I would be happy for reviews to tell me how I could improve my writing. Seriously, I asked you guys for your HONEST opinion and NO ONE said anything bad! I love you guys but I can't believe it, there is so much about this story that I HATE! Yet I can't stop writing it.

owo~ InkFlow


	7. The 59th Night

As Perusual Meeting You

By: InkFlow

Chapter 7: The 59th Night

A/N: So it seems that I have confused you readers in the last chapter... good. Hopefully this chapter will clear some things up for all of you. It was incredibly hard to write though!

"Carieve?" Matthew called out into the hallway, "Carieve? Are you there?" He asked again.

Odd. He was in a somewhat familiar hallway of a castle that was decorated in fancy side tables lining a wall filled with various pictures. It wasn't that he didn't expect to come to the castle; he knew he was going to arrive here tonight; it was that he wasn't in the main ball room like usual. Matthew decided to shrug it off and easily navigated his way to the said ball room.

Standing in the middle of the ball room, almost anxiously, with her back facing him, was Carieve. She wore a long and rather elegant dress that spread out all around her. Her warm mahogany hair was tied up into a ponytail, curled hair spilled out from behind her head. She turned around when hearing his footsteps. A smile decorated her made-up face and her expression lifted at the sight of Matthew.

"Matthew!" She said his name with joy before running over to envelope him in a hug.

Matthew kindly hugged her back, his own smile adorning his face. "My, you look quite lovely tonight," he commented, "What's the special occasion?"

"No occasion," she smiled at Matthew's cheap joke, "I just felt like dressing up tonight."

"Okay then," Matthew took her hand and spun Carieve around in one swift motion.

"Come, let us go to the gardens," Carieve tugged on the sleeve of his pajamas.

"Why the gardens?" He asked.

"Because, they look lovely out in the full moon tonight," Carieve insisted.

"Very well then," Matthew then jut out his elbow for Carieve to take, just like the gentleman he was.

As they weaved their way through the labyrinth off hallways to the castle gardens Carieve asked Matthew, "So, how old are you now?"

"About 18 and a half years now," Matthew answered her taking a left.

Soon enough the two were outside in the castle gardens enjoying the cool air. Carieve was right, the gardens were a beautiful place, but even more glorious in shine of the moonlight. Matthew and Carieve walked over to a small bench in front of a small patch of Zantedeschia, Madonna lilies, and one blooming blue flag iris. Looking out onto the gardens reminded Matthew of when he first visited the castle at 4 years of age.

He had been rather small and confused on his first visit to the castle. Matthew came there through his dreams. Why? He wasn't really sure at first; he thought it was just another ordinary dream, that is, until he talked to Carieve.

~owo~

She was surprised to see him at first. And after exchanging greetings and names she was confused as to why he was there at the castle in a small form. Matthew said he wasn't sure why he was there nor did he know who she was. She tried to explain where he was, who he was, and remind him of the time he lived here, but Matthew wasn't able to remember anything. So they spent the night talking, Carieve trying to explain the castle in everyway she could. Matthew believed everything she said, he really didn't have a choice, she was the only one in the castle.

The first night she told him that he was the prince of the castle and that she was the castle caretaker while he and his people were gone. He had asked why everyone was in the world he lived in now, but she claimed that she did not know, simply that soon they shall all return to their homeland. After some more explanations over the night, Matthew found that he had to go, he was waking up. The two of them did not know if he would visit the castle again within his dreams.

Soon enough, though, Matthew did visit again, about three months later. He was excited to see her another time, while she was surprised to see him, obviously having not believed she would see him again. Except with this dream about three months time had passed for Matthew, whereas for Carieve it was only the next night. Their worlds seemed to be moving at different paces through time. Every night Matthew visited the castle in its world, three months would have passed though his world. Matthew would age with each night he visited, so Carieve would ask how old he was; this quickly became a habit of Carieve's with every visit.

As more nights passed, Carieve taught Matthew more and more of what she knew about the castle and Matthew's relation to it. Matthew had no memorable knowledge for himself so it was all a new experience for him, he couldn't help but find it exciting. Soon enough Matthew learned the layout of the castle and knew it like the back of his hand. He also was able to figure out a pattern of when he would meet Carieve at the castle and started to record it on his calendar.

Once Matthew had suggested to Carieve about telling his parents of his "dream visits", feeling that he shouldn't keep such important (important to him at least) information from his fathers. She seemed to panic at hearing this but later told him that the kings must now know of his visits in the night, "for their knowing may disrupt the course fate and no one would be able to return to our world," she said. The topic was never brought up again.

Matthew's first visit was about 7 years ago for the time that he moved through in his world. Yet only 58 nights ago for Carieve in this world.

~owo~

Matthew now stared up at the moon, a small smile playing against his lips as he leaned back on the bench using his palms to hold his weight. Carieve looked up to the moon too, she smiled, a slight nervous air around her, but Matthew brushed it off.

"What are you thinking about?" She asked, breaking the silence.

"About the first time I came to the castle through my dreams," he answered.

"That was a long time ago for your current world's time, wasn't it?"

"Yes it was," Matthew gave a light chuckle.

"How have you been?" Carieve asked, looking over at Matthew.

"Fine," he smiled, "I've made a new friend as of recent."

"Oh really now?" She asked with a new piqued interest, "And who might this new friend of yours be?"

"His name is Ivan," Matthew smiled brighter, "Ivan Braginski."

Carieve visibly tensed at the name, her smile becoming a bit more forced as she looked at Matthew. "I-is that so?"

"Do you think he might be from this world too?" Matthew asked seeming oblivious or just ignoring of her sudden force at the words.

"Maybe, I do not know if all of the people from the world you are living in now are from our world. He probably wasn't anyone of importance in the kingdom, or he may be from another kingdom. I do not remember him."

"Oh," Matthew said with slight sadness in his voice.

Carieve turned towards Matthew and gave a sweet smile, "Cheer up now."

Matthew gave her a small smile of his own before turning to look back out to the garden. Matthew could hear Carieve inhale and exhale a deep breath. He turned to her in question. Matthew's look was met with Carieve's own nervous one; she seemed to be debating something in her head. Before Matthew could ask if anything was wrong, Carieve spoke up.

"You do know that I've known you for a long time now," she questioned.

"...Yes I do," Matthew answered her slowly.

"And that I knew you before you started visiting the castle in your dreams?" She asked another question.

"Yes, I know."

"We're the same age, in this world at least. I've know you since we first met when you were nine years old and I had just turned 10," Carieve continued, this was no new news to Matthew though; she had told him this before.

"I remember you telling me that. I'm sorry to say that I don't remember the event."

"I know, you remember nothing of this world, but it happened. We became friends of the castle, and I loved it," Carieve's eyes locked onto his, they seemed almost desperate. Matthew gave her a reassuring smile for her to continue whatever it was that she wanted to tell him.

Carieve took another deep inhale, this time holding it in for a bit before exhaling.

"I-I wanted to tell you something," she finally said.

"I had a feeling," Matthew seemed to almost chuckle.

"I-I wanted to tell you that, I… I love, you..." She trailed, her eyes quickly left his.

"Well, I love you too Carieve," he said simply, the words seeming to slide from his mouth.

"..." She frowned and brought her eyes back to his, "No... I don't mean like that," she said.

"Like what?" Matthew asked, clearly confused by her statement.

"How do you love me?" She asked.

"..." He paused in thought, "Like a sister I suppose," he finally answered.

"That's it, I don't love you like a brother, I, l-love you, love you."

"E-eh?" Matthew seemed to blush as his face turned to one of shock.

"I do. And I could tell that you weren't saying 'I love you' in the same sense that I was," she began speaking faster.

"A-and how do you k-know this?" Matthew sputtered out.

"Because I know you Matthew!" She claimed, her voice raising with each word, "I know how you claim your love for someone! You stutter and choke up so much out of nervousness, that the person you were telling your love to had to say it first," her voice went down, but barely.

"Ah- W-wait. Who have I claimed my love for?" He suddenly looked at her once more in question.

"Umm..." She stopped, her face scrunching up, as her eyes darted to the far left of Matthew's shoulder, "N-no one," she finally said.

"It must not have been you then, otherwise I think you would have told me," Matthew's voice was stern as he looked at her with less kindness in his eyes as at the start of this dream.

"B-but, you were supposed to love me, not him..." Her eyes became hard as they stabbed into Matthew's, "I was the one who loved you, not him," she said in near a whisper.

"..." Matthew sat frozen at his seat looking at her, his face having gone blank, "I-I think I-I need to g-go now."

"Then go," she said in a quiet growl.

Matthew then came to consciences as he forced himself awake and faded from the world of his dream.

~owo~

Matthew shot upright in his bed with a cold sweat surrounding him. He turned to look at his clock; it read 2:30 am. A sigh left his lips as Matthew slouched over. _Why did I have to mess things up like that? _He looked down to his hands, barely making out their outline in the darkness. He jerked his head up as another thought occurred to him, _Who? Who had I claimed my love for before? _

_...He?_

~owo~

Ivan smiled, he was excited. Why shouldn't he be? Ivan was, willingly, asked to hang out at a friend's house and even to stay the night! Sure it was mostly for a project, but the partners had not been assigned to this project, no, they too had been chosen willingly.

Ivan nearly bounded out of his house that fine Friday morning. He was ready for the school day to end before it could even begin. He walked slightly faster, with a tiny skip in his step too, but not enough for his sisters to take notice though. Speaking of his sisters, they had to walk faster in order to keep up with their long-legged brother, and as far as they knew he just woke up on the right side of the bed.

When all five students gathered together for their daily walk to school, everyone was engaged in the conversation, even Natalia. All of their bright behavior seemed out of place in the dreary English clouds. All of the students split up as soon as they reached the school, each heading to their separate classes.

To Ivan, the day could not go by fast enough. Classes were bad as is. But now that he had something to look forward to at the end of the day? The day would take forever! For the most part, Ivan passed his time by staring blankly out of a window in his classes, barely paying attention to his teachers. He noted the clouds slowly scattering to show a bit more sunshine on the late in November day. It was nearly December, and that meant winter was right around the corner. Though the temperatures had dropped to winter chills, snow had not yet come to visit the area-

Ivan snapped out of his haze at the sound of the school bell, signaling lunch time for the building's occupants. Ivan rose quickly, gathering his books and heading to join Matthew in the lunch room.

(._.)~I needed to time skip to the end of the school day~ (._.)

Ivan followed behind Matthew through the park, Alfred trailed behind Natalia rather closely, seeming to be bothering her; and Katyusha walked in front, her head seeming to be in the clouds. Well, the few clouds that were left from the morning.

Ivan glanced over to Alfred behind his little sister. Alfred's black eye was still fairly swollen, but had healed for the most part. Ivan had remembered what Matthew said yesterday when Ivan had brought up the problem of his brother not liking him. _'Oh, he'll be fine. Al has a thing, whatever it is, that Friday evening.'_ Ivan couldn't help but wonder what this 'thing' was that Alfred was going to, but decided not to dawn on it for too long. As is, all that his sisters knew was that he was staying the night at a friend's house, end of details. Surprisingly enough, his sisters seemed fine with it, Katyusha saying nothing more than 'I'm glad that you are making friends my little Ivan.' His father didn't know; his father didn't really need to know. His father usually went out for drinks Friday evenings as is.

His eyes still on Alfred, Ivan watched as Alfred leaned down and whispered something into Natalia's ear. She swung around and smacked him in the face as response, her face blooming into a bright red. Everyone stopped walking and looked at the two.

"Dammit Alfred, don't do that!" Natalia growled, her eyes stabbing daggers at Alfred.

"Nufufu," Alfred giggled while holding his recently slapped cheek.

"What did he say sister?" Ivan asked.

Natalia swung around behind Ivan, grabbing onto the sleeve of his jacket. Her face peeked around his arm at Alfred, "Horrible things," she replied in a hiss.

Alfred held up his hands in a mock defense as Ivan looked him over skeptically.

"You should beat him up," Natalia stated quietly.

"Gladly!" Ivan said, taking a threatening step forward.

"Whoa! I didn't say anything!" Alfred said seeming to begin to panic.

"Oh, reall-" "Break it up!"

All eyes shot over to Katyusha, whom had shoved herself between the two boys. She shot a (what seemed to be disappointed in Ivan's point of view) look Natalia's way.

"Sorry," the three chimed together, Matthew staying silent as he simply observed the happenings, not getting himself involved.

… There was a pause between the five students, it wasn't until Alfred made the first move forward through the park that everyone followed the suite and they moved through the park once again. Eventually they parted reaching the end of the park.

"See you later," Matthew said giving a wave to Ivan and his sisters as they walked away. Ivan spun around and walked backwards while waving back to Matthew.

"Good bye. See you too!" Ivan said with a smile before spinning back around to walk with his sisters in a normal manner.

Once Ivan and his sisters reached their house, he headed up to his room. Matthew had told him to come over to his house about 4 o'clock, when Alfred would leave for his 'thing'; giving Ivan about an hour before having to head to Matthew's house. So, Ivan used his time to double check his bags, making sure he had the art supplies he needed to create his portrait of Matthew... This unfortunately only took him about ten minutes. Ivan sat in his bedroom, not sure what to do with himself for the time being. He decided to head downstairs to pass the time with his sisters.

Ivan slowly made his way down the stairs. Peeking around the corner of the stairway rails childishly, he found neither of his sisters in the living room nor the kitchen. Odd, usually he could find them reading or doing whatever in the living room. Ivan took slow quiet steps up the stairs before reaching Katyusha's room; he brought his ear up to the door and heard nothing. Though he could hear light voices coming from Natalia's room just a bit further down the hall. Taking quiet steps, Ivan headed to his little sister's room. A loud creak was heard as Ivan managed to step on the only creaky floorboard in the house, he froze, the voices stopped from within Natalia's room. Thinking fast, Ivan walked past his sister's room to the bathroom making it seem as if he was heading there.

There was a pause before the voices started speaking again. He then took silent steps across the hallway to Natalia's room and pressed his ear up against the door.

"I'm not wearing that," Ivan heard Natalia say.

"Let me just see how is looks on you," he heard Katyusha bargain with her.

"No, that looks ridiculous," Natalia retorted.

"You don't have to wear it. I just want to see how it looks," Katyusha said again.

"... Fine," Ivan heard shuffling from within the room.

_What are my sisters doing? _Ivan thought to himself. It was something to do with clothes, or jewelry, Ivan figured that much. Though it was unusual for Ivan's sisters to be talking about such things, especially, his little sister, but he decided it would be better if he stayed out of whatever it was that they were doing. Sneaking back to his room, Ivan made sure to avoid the only creaky floorboard in the house.

He sat down on his bed and glanced at the clock. 4:26 it read.

~owo~

Matthew fluttered around his house, this way and that, trying to clean it up as much as he could.

"Dude what are you cleaning up so much for?" His brother asked.

"Don't you have a thingy to get ready for?" Matthew counterattacked, avoiding Alfred's question while wiping down one of the kitchen counters, "I thought you said you were leaving for that at 4:45 or whenever before five?"

"...Is someone coming over at five?" His brother asked.

"Uhh…" Matthew came up blank with a reply. In response his brother jumped up and stole the paper towel Matthew was currently using to wipe down the counter with one hand and grabbed Matthew's wrist with the other, forcing Matthew to look at him.

Matthew was frightened in the least at his brother's sudden actions. He brought his eyes to meet Alfred's. Quickly, Matthew made up a somewhat believable lie.

"U-um, Katyusha is coming over..." Matthew said with a slight blush at the implications that his brother might get at from the statement.

"..." Alfred looked a little harder into his brother's eyes before his face lit up, "Aw, shoot Mattie. If you had a girl coming over you could have just told me," Alfred said releasing Matthew's wrist to give him a nudge and a wink.

"Al! D-don't assume th-things," Matthew stuttered at his brother's suggestive gestures.

"So I'm assu-er, guessing you want me to leave before five so you two can be alone?" Alfred inquired.

"Yes please," Matthew perked up.

"No problem little bro," Alfred smiled at Matthew's eagerness.

"Little? Oh that's cute Al," Matthew scoffed at his little brother.

"I'm still taller," Alfred mumbled looking off to the side.

"By what? Two millimeters?" Matthew joked.

"Shuddap! Don't you have a girl coming over?" Alfred asked in annoyance.

"Don't you have a 'thingy' to go to?" Matthew countered.

~owo~

Finally! Ivan thought five o'clock would never come! Well at least a little before five so that he would have time to make his way to Matthew's house. With a goodbye shouting up the stairwell so that his sisters (still doing whatever in Natalia's room) could hear him, Ivan left his house with a sleeping bag, and one other bag to hold his art supplies and clothes for the night.

The air was crisp, cool. The sun still shown above him yet was far to the west now, not quite ready to set. The only sound Ivan heard were his footsteps, rapid, not slowing down for anything.

Within a few minutes he stood before Matthew's house giving the door a quick glance over for any sign of a doorbell, when one wasn't found, Ivan brought up his hand to knock on the door. He heard some stomping from inside the house and before he could knock, Matthew opened it up for him.

"Bonjour Ivan!" Matthew said in with a slight pant, as if he had just been running around.

"Uh... Privet Matthew," Ivan responded, his hand hanging awkwardly in the air.

"Please, come in," Matthew stepped aside for Ivan to enter the warm, sky-blue home.

"Of course," Ivan responded taking a step into the house. His eyes instantly made contact with a bright red blanket draped over a deep chocolate brown couch in the living room just across from the doorway. The house was cozy, filled with various warm colors about the area Ivan could see. It was nice, comfortable, unlike the seemingly cold house Ivan, his sisters, and his father lived in.

"You can kick off your shoes here," Matthew said gesturing to a small carpet next to the door covered with a small pile of shoes; effectively breaking Ivan from his observational thought bubble.

Ivan did as Matthew said and slipped his large feet out from his shoes, placing them on the little carpet.

"Can I take your sleeping bag?" Matthew politely asked, holding his hand out for Ivan to place his sleeping bag into Matthew's care.

"Oh, sure," Ivan placed the sleeping bag in Matthew's arms.

"Come this way, we can put your things into my room and then start on the project," Matthew said spinning around to the left of the front door. Ivan followed behind, noticing Matthew's hair in a small ponytail. He smiled at the odd sight, and swatted at the ponytail in a silent questioning as to why he had it. Matthew turned and looked at him oddly, "What are you doing?" He asked as Ivan kept smiling.

"Your hair in a hair tie," Ivan stated.

"Is there a problem with that?" Matthew asked in genuine curiosity, not at all meaning to be rude.

"No," Ivan said, " I was just bringing attention to it. I haven't seen you put your hair up like such."

"Yeah, well I really only do it when I'm cleaning or cooking, something I picked up from my papa," Matthew then turned back around and headed up to a somewhat narrow hallway, passing by a well used kitchen on their way.

The staircase walls were littered with pictures. From both side of the staircase the pictures seemed to surround them. Many of them didn't even have frames around them, simply being tacked up onto the wall in every corner that they could take up. Ivan could spot a painting among the hundreds of photographs every once and a while as they moved slowly up the stairs. It was, interesting, Ivan thought to himself. Matthew's family was cheerful in each of their pictures, none of the smiles were strained, and everyone was happy to be where ever they were; with their family.

The two boys entered a roomier hallway, breaking Ivan's gaze from the many pictures of the staircase. There were quite a few pictures in this hallway too, though not as many as what the staircase had contained; more of these pictures were framed too.

"Mrow?" Ivan gave a slight jump at the sudden intrusion of noise. He shot his head down to the general direction of the noise, but Matthew's back was in the way. Leaning a bit to the side, Ivan peered around Matthew to see two glowing orbs in the dark hallway.

"Hello Samria," Mathew said cheerfully. He opened a door leading to what Ivan assumed to be his bedroom. The light let in by the room revealed the two glowing orbs to be attached to the body of a cat. Samria, as Matthew had called her, meowed again looking curiously at the two boys.

Matthew slipped passed the cat into his room before setting down Ivan's sleeping bag. Samria followed closely behind Matthew as Ivan entered after the two. He watched to see if Matthew would give the cat the attention it seemed to be requesting from him.

"You can set your bag down at the end of the bed," Matthew said, he smiled, "Don't worry; Samria won't go harming your things."

Ivan did as he said, looking out the window right in front of him, Ivan saw that Matthew's room looked out to the park across the street. Ivan then spotted Sadiq, an older student who he had little interaction with, but still enough to recognize him. Ivan watched as Sadiq exited the brick wall opening from the park. He made a stage right and followed the sidewalk to his destination. Ivan couldn't help but wonder if Sadiq lived nearby too.

Ivan turned around to once again face Matthew. "Hey do you know if-" Ivan began but then stopped. He found Matthew standing with Samria sitting on his shoulders. Ivan looked at the two oddly, for a moment before Matthew's face broke out into a cheeky grin.

"She does this a lot when strangers come over," Matthew gave a small giggle; "It's her way of 'protecting' the family."

"Ah, I see," Ivan said, still giving Matthew an odd look, though a small smile had broken out on his face at the sight.

"Do I know if what?" Matthew asked bringing Ivan's attention back to his previous statement.

"Oh, I was wondering if you knew if Sadiq lived on the same street as us?" Ivan asked.

"Hmm…" Matthew thought for a moment, "Oh! Sadiq is that upperclassmen who sometimes talks with Katyusha, right?"

"…" Ivan thought for a moment seeming to remember that Sadiq did talk to Katyusha every once and a while, "Yes. That is him."

"I don't believe he lives on this street… Why exactly?" Matthew looked at Ivan now realizing that Ivan's question in no way related to what they had been talking about before.

"Oh, I just saw him come from the park. I thought it might mean he lives by," Ivan stated glancing out the window once more; Sadiq was now out of sight.

"…Never mind that. Shall we get working on our project?" Matthew asked. He crouched down next to a desk in his room, rummaging around for a moment before he pulled out some charcoal and a fairly large sheet to draw on, "Do you have supplies?" Matthew asked as he looked up to find Ivan bare handed.

"Oh, yes I do," Ivan quickly grabbed out a canvas, watercolors, and paintbrushes from his bag.

Leading the way, Matthew left the room, Samria still riding on his shoulders, "I was thinking we could work outside, seeing as the sun decided to join us this fine evening," Matthew suggested with a smile on his face.

"Yes that sound nice," Ivan responded following after Matthew.

~oUo~

A/N: I am a horrible piece of scum… Auugh. I said I would get this chapter out to you as soon as I could but I LIED! I'm so sorry my readers. Excuse: I have been rather busy, even over Winter break, and I got life changing news! Also I've been rather 'active' on Deviantart. My user name is FlowofInk if any of you want to check out my art... But the biggest reason is just because I'm a huge lazy ass.

SAD.

But this chapter is done now, and the next chapter will have their miraculous sleep over! Hooray!

There are no translations for this chapter.

Disclaimer: I do not own Hetalia, just the very screwed up plotline of this written story before you. Hetalia belongs to Hidekaz Himayura and all that jazz.

Oh! My readers, please give me some constructive criticism on how I can improve my writing! Thank You

owo~ InkFlow


	8. Who Sleeps at Sleepovers?

As Perusual Meeting You

By: InkFlow

Chapter 8: Who sleeps at Sleepovers?

Ivan and Matthew stood outside in Matthew's backyard about two and a half meters away for each other. They had decided that Ivan would draw Matthew first, seeing as he had watercolors and this would let the paint dry, or some shit like that. Both set down short stools they had dragged outside along with their supplies to avoid having to stand the entire time of their working.

"Are you sure you don't want an easel Ivan?" Matthew asked trying to bring his voice to be loud enough for Ivan to hear.

"No worries, I paint like this all the time," Ivan responded sitting down on the short stool, bringing himself close to the ground.

"Ok then. How would you like me to pose?" Matthew smiled, "Like this?" He took a wide step and thrust out his arms, "Or this?" He sat on the tiny stool in the infamous 'Thinker pose' putting on a serious face.

Ivan giggled at Matthew dancing around as he struck various 'poses'. "But Matvey, I am supposed to capture you in a pose that is very 'you'," Ivan said bringing his fingers in a bunny ear bounce to emphasize the sarcasm around the word.

"Oh? And what pose do you think captures 'me'?" Matthew had a foolish grin across his face.

"It is very simple, really," Ivan smiled his own foolish grin.

"Oh really now?" Matthew inquired.

"Yes. I simply need you to slouch over!" Ivan said with a giggle.

"Are you implying something Mister Ivan?" Matthew asked with an accusing look.

"Am I? Mister Matthew?" Ivan chuckled at Matthew's reaction.

Matthew chuckled along with Ivan before asking Ivan once again, "But, seriously, how would you like for me to pose?"

Ivan thought for a moment, "Sit down on your mini stool," Matthew sat obeying Ivan's request, "Bring your knees up close to your chest, but not too close. Rest your elbow on your knee and cup your chin in your hand."

"Like this?" Matthew asked pulling his body into the position Ivan described. At this, Samria popped up from her hiding spot in the bush nearby. She hopped up onto Matthew's shoulders and spread herself across his shoulders, "Samria, honey, you can't-" Matthew began, bringing his arms behind his head.

"No!" Ivan shouted. Matthew shot his head in Ivan's direction, "Sorry. Just, keep her there, she would be a good addition to the painting," he continued.

"…Oh, ok then," Matthew said, pulling his arms back down to their position a moment earlier.

"Now, turn your head a little to the left," Ivan continued. Matthew turned his head to the left, his left, "No I mean my left... good. Now look off and up towards that tree," Matthew did as Ivan said.

"Is this fine?" Matthew asked, keeping his chin cupped in his hand.

"Yes, that's good. Keep still, just like that," Ivan said.

Matthew kept still as Ivan began to quickly sketch out a light outline on his canvas. Ivan's eyes taking in the basic shape of Matthew's position before starting on the paints. Ivan would occasionally glance down to his canvas, but majority of the time would stay on his model, taking each of Matthew's features. The sun seemed to shine down wonderfully on Matthew, making his hair glow with the light. Matthew looked... remarkable, in Ivan's point of view. ...A moment of thought and Ivan shook it away, he needed to concentrate now.

Ivan focused on the colors of Matthew's hair in the glow of the sunlight. Odd, Ivan noticed a peculiar hair that stuck up from the rest of Matthew's head. He hadn't noticed it there before, had it been there before? The little hair bounced slightly, but didn't seem to bother Matthew at all... How peculiar.

"Matthew, are you aware there is some of your hair sticking up and bouncing around in front of your face," Ivan asked, deciding to bring it to Matthew's attention.

"Hmm?" Matthew's eyes looked in Ivan's direction, but otherwise the rest of his body kept still, "Oh that," he said seeming to be brought back to the reality from his daydream, "Don't mind that hair. It's nothing."

Ivan shrugged, deciding it was a cowlick Matthew stopped giving a fuck about. He brought his attention back to his art work. It was coming out quite well in his opinion, Ivan smiled. He liked Matvey, he liked that Matthew would even let him call him Matvey. Matvey never seemed to disapprove of what Ivan chose to do, Matvey simply accepted Ivan for who he was, and that made Ivan smile with joy ... A real, true smile.

Not as a mask.

~owo~

Matthew used swift, large movements of his arm to create his image of Ivan using the colored charcoal. They sat about half a meter closer now, for Matthew to get a closer look at Ivan, every once and awhile adjusting his glasses on his nose. Ivan sat still, straight, with his eyes closed he could not see Matthew, nor could he see Matthew stick his tongue slightly in concentration, a habit Matthew had yet to break.

Matthew smiled as he occasionally glanced down at his work, the closer to setting sun now providing an excellent angle of light for him to draw Ivan with. There was absolute silence between them as Matthew drew, the same silence as when Ivan was previously painting Matthew, yet unlike other silences these two had experienced with other people, this wasn't awkward, it was comfortable. Much like the other silences shared between them Matthew mused. He smiled as he added the finishing touches to his drawing of Ivan. Matthew liked being with Ivan, he was nice and easy to talk with, he rarely felt awkward with Ivan, and he could tell it was the same for Ivan.

"Done," Matthew finally said breaking the silence.

"May I see?" Ivan asked opening his eyes. Those deep amethysts Matthew couldn't add to his image in order to capture the true calm feeling Ivan's face displayed on the paper.

"Only if you let me see your painting first, eh," Matthew insisted, since Ivan wouldn't let him see once the painting was finished.

"..." Ivan frowned slightly, but it had a playful tone to it, Matthew could tell, "Fine then, we will not see each others portraits until we present them to class," Ivan answered, a slight pout on his face.

Matthew laughed. Something he felt he could do freely with Ivan, "Ok then, so be it. We can leave our pieces out on the porch so that they stay dry in case it rains, but so that we are not compelled to look."

"Da," Ivan got up and brought his now painted canvas over to the aforementioned porch and leaned it on the side of the house with the unpainted side facing Matthew so that he couldn't see.

Matthew got up shortly after Ivan and set his paper in the same fashion right next to Ivan's painting. They both headed back over to grab their supplies they left out on the grass.

"So, we can head in, clean your paint brushes, get a drink, and relax a little bit. Does that sound good to you?" Matthew asked as he bent down to make sure his charcoal was in it's place within the little box that held the pieces.

"Yes that sounds nice," Ivan responded gathering his paints and brushes.

~owo~

The two headed in, Ivan after Matthew, to the house each holding their supplies and the tiny stools they had sat on. They came into the living room to be met with warm smells coming from the kitchen and Matthew's father, Arthur (Ivan believed his name to be), reading on the couch.

"Oh, hello boys," Arthur said looking up from his book, "I was beginning to wonder when you two would come inside," he added on.

"Hello dad," Matthew began before his other father, Francis (Ivan remembered), poked his head around the corner from the kitchen.

"Bonjour Matthew! Ivan!" Francis said cheerfully regarding both boys whom had just entered.

"Bonjour papa, dad," Matthew said politely, "When did you two get home?" He asked.

"I just got home a little bit ago Matthew," Arthur answered, bringing his attention back to his book for a brief moment.

"I got 'ome sometime earlier, but I noticed you two were busy working outside, so I didn't want to disturb you," Francis answered as he came over to hug Matthew. He turned to Ivan with apt interest, "And you must be Ivan I believe? Matthew's friend?" There was some form of recognition in his eyes.

"Uh..." Ivan felt slightly nervous somehow. He was never good with meeting new people, and Ivan wasn't sure what to say to either of Matthew's fathers, "Da, I am. If I am correct, your name is Francis, right? I have heard a bit about you from Matthew," Ivan managed. His mind let his mouth take over, and his voice reverting to its defensive, higher tone. Had it even gone down to its normal tone while with Matvey? Ivan hadn't even noticed.

"Yes, my name is Francis," Matthew's father smiled, Ivan was unable to shake hands with the Frenchmen because of the items he currently held, "And I've 'eard a lot about you as well from mon petit Matthieu!"

"P-papa!" Matthew cried, suddenly flustered by the harmless nickname his father used in front of his friend.

"Matthew 'as mentioned you often," Francis continued ignoring his son's embarrassment.

He talks about me? Ivan thought to himself. Were they good things that Matthew mentioned to his fathers? He felt increasingly self conscious as Francis continued to talk.

"You two seem to be great friends!" Francis said with a bright smile, Ivan could hear Arthur chuckle from behind his book. Ding! "Oh, dinner is near ready. Why don't you two run up put your zings away, clean up a bit, and get ready for dinner?"

"I'll help you set the table," Arthur said setting down his book after marking the page he currently was on.

"Oui papa, we'll be down in a moment," Matthew said leading Ivan back up the picture plastered staircase. Samria followed closely behind.

Dinner was interesting for Ivan. Conversations were lively and occasionally broke out into slight bickering between Matthew's parents, with Matthew as the peacemaker; though not the most well heard one. Both of Matthew's fathers would try and bring either Ivan or the ever quiet Matthew into their conversations, more so Ivan, seeming as they wanted to learn so much about him. Ivan was able to learn quite a bit about Francis and Arthur as well, along with some embarrassing stories from when Matthew was young.

Never the less, dinner with Matthew's family (minus Alfred for the night, though Ivan would have guessed the table would have been much louder than it already was) had been an interesting experience for him. At his home, even on the few nights that his father might have been there, dinner was rather on the quiet side, mostly just filled with light chatter from his sisters. Ivan did love his sisters, but now that he had something to compare his dinners to, he realized that they were rather quiet, and not as warm as Matvey's. He wasn't sure how that made him feel.

After dinner everyone helped out to clear the table. With each person taking their dishes to the counter around the sink as Francis filled the said sink with dish soap and water. Once the table was cleared Matthew and Ivan wiped it down as Arthur and Francis began washing the dishes in the sink.

"Is everyzing cleared?" Francis asked glancing up from the dish he was cleaning.

"Oui, papa. May we go now?" Matthew responded.

"Of course, unless you two want to stay and chat?" Francis offered.

"No thank you papa. If you need us we'll be upstairs," Matthew politely declined his father's offer. Ivan could hear Francis mumble something about 'Our boys never want to chat with us old men anymore,' rather dramatically.

Arthur scoffed before speaking up, stopping Ivan and Matthew before they could head up the stairs to Matthew's room, "Hey Matthew, before I forget..." he started.

"Yes dad?" Matthew turned around, giving a look of 'please just let me go', Which made Ivan chuckle ever so slightly.

"Tomorrow afternoon your brother and you are going to do some training. It's been a while and I want to make sure you two aren't rusty," Arthur said.

"Yes of course dad, I'll make sure to tell Al tomorrow."

"Good," and Arthur left it at that.

"Training?" Ivan offered in question, what on earth did Matthew's father mean by that?

"Oh it's nothing..." Matthew said nonchalantly, "Come on!" Matthew urged. Both of them rushed up the stairs and into Matthew's room. "Oh, thank god!" Matthew said leaning on the door he all too eagerly closed. His face flushed a bit.

"Was something wrong?" Ivan asked, not seeing a reason for Matthew to be acting like such.

"I thought they would never stop talking! Geeze, it's like they had to say every embarrassing story from my youth!" Matthew said shuffling onto the ground. Ivan followed the suit next to Matthew, he chuckled.

"I don't see how it was that bad," Ivan poked Matvey's cheek, "I don't mind hearing stories of you in the tub with your brother when you were little."

"S-shut up!" Matthew stuttered out, his cheeks turning more red at the statement, "What if you were in my shoes, eh?!" He asked.

"... True, Katyusha wouldn't hesitate to tell every embarrassing moment of my childhood," Ivan said.

"HA!"

"But I'm not in your shoes now am I?" Ivan chuckled again, "And now I have bait over you just in case!"

"Bait? In case of what?" Matthew looked at Ivan in slight horror.

"In case I want something!" Ivan sing-songed, poking Matthew's cheek once more.

"Stop it, eh," Matthew giggled a bit, which made Ivan smile, "What could you possibly want from me?"

"Hmm..." Ivan shrugged, "I'm not sure, but maybe I would come up with something when the time comes."

"... I hope it won't be necessary,"

"As do I Matvey," Ivan hummed.

They began to fall into to meaningless chatter once again. Talking about everything and nothing all at once. Ivan couldn't help but be grateful for these moments, where someone was just there with him, acknowledging him, treating him like an actual person. Ivan loved it. He wondered if Matvey liked his presence as well.

~owo~

Soon enough Matthew asked "Are you thirsty?"

"Thirsty?" Ivan echoed.

"Yeah. I'm a little thirsty, eh. Do you want something to drink?"

"I guess that sounds good about now."

"Ok," Matthew got up and offered his hand to help Ivan up. Ivan took it and Matthew hoisted him up, "Now follow behind me and be quiet."

"Um. Why? May I ask," Ivan played an adorably confused look across his face.

"..." Matthew stopped a moment as a quick thought that Ivan looked cute like that passed his mind ... Snap out of it Matthew! He mentally chastised himself before replying, "God forbid we run into my parents and they tell you more ridiculous stories about me... with visual presentation." He mumbled, "And they have an absurd amount."

"Oh," Ivan tried to stifle a chuckle but Matthew could easily see that it was futile as Ivan's cheeks puffed out in laughter, "I don't mind, I bet you were adorable as a child!"

"T-that's not the point!" Matthew's cheeks burned.

"But I will be quiet for you Matvey," Ivan said with a smile.

"Thank you," Matthew sighed in relief.

As 'secret agent mode activated, Matthew slowly and silently snuck up to the staircase, Ivan followed behind just as silent. Matthew peeked around the corner and listened for any sounds. Nothing, not a sound, and from his visual perspective no one in the kitchen. But his parents could just as easily be in the living room. Cautiously Matthew took a step down, keeping his weight even to avoid creaking of the wood underneath the carpet of the staircase. With each step he became more relaxed when he didn't even hear any scuffling or breathing from around the corner. Becoming more cautious as he peeked around the corner, Matthew stopped and blinked... No one was there, the living room was abandoned, a single lamp providing enough light for half of the room.

Matthew relaxed seeing as the coast was clear, "We're clear," he said with a happy sigh. Matthew didn't receive a response, was Ivan even still behind him? He hadn't heard the taller teen as he had taken silent steps down the stairs. Turning, Matthew jumped, Ivan was incredibly close and nearly nose to nose with him. "Holy Crap!" Matthew stated as scooted away from the russian.

Ivan chuckled at this response, "I was wondering how long it would take you to notice."

"Well when I didn't get a reply, much less a sound, I thought you had up and left," Matthew retorted.

"Oh, no, I have no need for that," Ivan said as he moved towards the kitchen.

"..." Matthew followed him, "Cups are up in this cupboard," he said as he reached up for two glasses.

Matthew walked around the kitchen grabbing glasses, ice, and then heading over to the tap for water. Ivan stood to the side of the kitchen watching as Matthew did these things. Once the glasses were filled with water and ice, Matthew handed a glass to Ivan, who took it graciously. They made their way to the living room and, switching on another lamp light, plopped down on the largest couch next to each other.

Taking a large gulp of his water, Matthew said nothing. Ivan too said nothing as he took smaller, more continuous sips of water from his glass. As Matthew stared into his glass, he felt Ivan's eyes on him. He took another drink waiting for the feeling to leave, when it didn't he turned his attention towards Ivan. "Is there something on my face?" He asked.

"Oh, no. There is nothing," Ivan replied in a quiet voice, still seeming to concentrate.

Matthew took another drink, this time Ivan's impending stare seemed more obvious. And then Ivan tipped Matthew's glass over onto him as he drank. Immediately, reflex kicked in and Matthew tipped the glass to an angle to where it would hold it's contents instead on pour on him. He sputtered.

"What on earth was that for?" Matthew asked, his shirt now damp from the water being spilled onto him.

As he looked up at Ivan, Matthew saw a mischievous smile across Ivan's face. Matthew mirrored it.

"So that's how you want to play? Well two can easily play at this game," Matthew purred as he grabbed Ivan's own drink and began to force the cup's contents onto Ivan. The russian resisted with a giggle, before the glass slipped from his fingers. The energy Matthew had been previously using now no longer having resistance, sent his hand with the cup shooting upwards towards Ivan's face. Matthew stopped himself before the glass could knock Ivan in the chin, but that didn't stop the water from leaving the glass and splashing all over Ivan's chin.

"..." The two of them sat in silence for a moment. Then Ivan burst out laughing, with Matthew following right after.

"Hee hee, you should see your face!" Matthew giggled out.

"Oh you think we're done?" Ivan said with a smirk.

"Wha-Ahh! Pppth ptth!" Matthew spit out the water from Ivan's glass, it seemed to have been the remaining water in his cup besides the ice that remained. "... HA!" Matthew splashed the last of his cup's water onto Ivan.

Both of them sat, ridiculous smiles on their wet faces as they giggled like madmen. Ivan was the first of the two to calm down enough to speak once again.

"We should get cleaned up, da?" He asked.

"Oh you're the one to talk! You started it!" Matthew said a smile still across his face.

"Da. But you ended it." Ivan retorted.

"Shut up," Matthew whispered, giving Ivan a playful shove.

Matthew stood with Ivan following shortly after. They headed over to the kitchen and put their glasses away in the sink before grabbing some paper towels to dry off the bits of the couch that gotten wet in the crossfire. Once that was done the two of them headed back up to Matthew's room to change into dryer clothes after Matthew grabbed two towels from the linen closet next to his room.

"..." Matthew looked at the clock in his room as he closed the door. It read 8:27 pm, "It seems late enough for us to change into our pajamas."

"Hmm?" Ivan's eyes followed Matthew's trail and and read the clock as well, "I suppose so."

"We will be staying up a little late though..." Matthew trailed.

"And why is that?" Ivan asked as he began to rummage through his bag.

"There's someone who I want you to meet!" Matthew said grabbing the pajamas he had folded on top of his bed.

"..." Ivan turned around and looked at Matthew with a funny face, "Who would come to meet us so late at night? And why? Are they going to climb through the window or something?"

"Heh," Matthew chuckled, "You'll see," he said with a mischievous air around him.

"... Fine then..." Ivan gave a slight pout.

Ivan began to pull his still wet clothes off of his body at the opposite end of the room from Matthew. Both boys faced away from each other. Matthew watched from the corner of his eye where Ivan wouldn't notice as a few water droplets slid from Ivan's shoulders down his broad back. Ivan bent over to grab the towel Matthew had given him when they first entered the room, from this Matthew got a fabulous view of Ivan's bum... Matthew gave a silent hum of appreciation before turning back and mentally chastising himself. It's just a butt, there is nothing amazing about a butt, he thought now watching the wall.

~owo~

Ivan turned around to face Matvey now dry and wearing proper sleeping clothing. Matvey's back still faced him, now currently without the shirt he had soaked. Ivan made a mental victory at his previous accomplishment of a water fight as he sat cross legged on the ground.

His eyes observed Matvey as the said canadian dried his slightly damp hair. His back was straight, a rare sight for many to witness, and Ivan couldn't help but admire the view given to him. But the view was brief as Matvey slid a shirt over his smooth skinned figure. There was a moment longer where Ivan observed, but he eventually pulled his eyes away when Matvey began to slide his pants down. He shouldn't be looking at Matthew in such a way in the first place! It wasn't polite. ...As if I'm polite, Ivan thought sarcastically to himself. He dragged his eyes over to a bookshelf that sat to his right, resting his hand in his palm.

The bookshelf was stuffed with books, so many books that small piles were stacked around the shelf as well. One book caught Ivan's attention especially. It was a large book with golden cursive lettering along it's spine. Unfortunately the cursive writing was so "fancy" that it was too difficult for him to read all of it, the only thing Ivan could make out was a P and an A. He wondered what the book contained within its covers, what books could Matvey possibly like?

"What are you looking at?" Matthew asked from Ivan's left.

"!" Ivan jumped, his head leaving it's perch from his hand to regard the canadian now standing closely to him, face to face, "W-what?" Ivan asked startled. Dammit! Why was Matvey so silent?!

"Heh," Matthew gave a light laugh, "I asked what were you looking at?"

"Oh... I was just looking at your books," Ivan answered regaining his composure.

"Anything that catches your eye?" Matthew asked sitting cross legged in front of Ivan at he too looked at the bookshelf.

"...Um, the large book," Ivan said pointing to the said book, "With the gold lettering."

"Hmm?" Matthew quipped an eyebrow and crawled over to the book pulling it out of it's place, "...Oh! This is one of the family albums I have."

"A family album? You mean your staircase wall wasn't your family album?" Ivan said jokingly.

"Shut up," Matthew said sticking out his tongue childishly. He then moved to place the book back in it's place on the stuffed bookshelf.

"Wait. I would like to see what pictures you have," Ivan said.

"Really?" Matthew paused "...Um okay then," he replied while scooting over next to Ivan and opening the book.

Both boys peered inside the book, a picture of Matvey and Alfred dancing with towels tied around their necks was on the front page. Matthew gave a fond smile to the picture, Ivan gave an amused smirk. What a peculiar pair the two must have been as children, Ivan thought as Matthew turned the page. The largest picture on the left page caught Ivan attention first, it was a picture of an unfamiliar woman holding a baby in her arms. She had long dark brown hair and slightly tanned skin, her eyes were closed in the picture but smile lines crinkled the corner of her said eyes, if not being barely noticeable. She had a similar face shape to Matvey and Alfred, causing Ivan to grow suspicious as to whom she might be.

A very young toddler sat next to her looking up at the woman with a smile on his face. Ivan guessed the toddler was Matvey, seeing as the child in the picture had wavy blond hair, with the same ridiculous curl sticking up in front of his face, and violet-blue eyes such as Matvey.

"Who is that?" Ivan asked pointing to the woman, though he had a feeling that he already knew the answer.

"That's mine and Al's mother," Matthew answered looking at her fondly, "...She passed away when we were young, so Al and I don't remember her much."

"Hmm," Ivan gave a quiet hum, unsure of what to say. She reminded him of his own mother, a woman that passed on (or so he was told, there was no formal funeral) before Ivan truly got to know her. He was unsure how Matthew's mother reminded him of his own, they looked nothing alike, they just, had some kind of resemblance Ivan couldn't quite place his finger on.

In the next picture over, there was Francis and Arthur holding what he assumed to be little Matvey and Alfred. Scratched across their faces was a complete look of utter confusion, as if they didn't know what was going on as they held the babies. Well, baby, Matvey looked more like a young toddler in the picture... But, Matvey had told him that he and Alfred were twins. And the woman made him wonder even more.

"Matvey, how does your family work exactly," Ivan asked trying to place his words in a conceivable order, "Are you and your brother adopted? or..." Ivan trailed.

"Oh!" Matthew perked up, "I probably told you some bullshit story when we first met like Al and I are twins, right?"

"...uh-Da?" Ivan replied, surprised at Matthew's swearing and unsure of where this was heading.

"Well, actually, we're farther than that," Matthew looked back down at the picture of his mother, "Alfred and I are half-brothers. That is our mother," Matthew pointed to his previously deemed mother, "Papa, or Francis, is my father," Matthew dragged his hand over the page and pointed to the confused Francis in the picture, "And dad, Arthur, is Al's father," Matthew pointed to the also confused Arthur.

"... Was your mother a surrogate mother?" Ivan asked.

"Something like that, I'm not quite sure though," Matthew paused in thought, "Papa and dad phrased it in a weird way..."

"I see," Ivan left it at that and refocused his attention to the photo album as Matthew turned another page.

~owo~

About an hour and a half had passed of Matthew and Ivan looking through the photo album, Matthew occasionally sharing stories with some pictures.

It was nice just sitting, listening to Matvey's soft voice. Occasionally Ivan would add in a comment, but he didn't want to spoil the serenity that was Matvey's voice. It didn't stutter or waver at all, and that made Ivan feel happy, Matvey very comfortable with Ivan, and vise-versa.

Ivan wavered once Matvey's voice had finally stopped, his eyes opening a little wider as he realised they had drooped down partway. Matvey shifted away to put his family album back on the bookshelf. Ivan found himself having to shift as well, apparently he had started leaning on Matvey partway through "story time", and yet Matvey didn't seem to mind.

"Are you sleepy yet?" Matthew asked now standing. He smiled as he leaned down and poked Ivan's nose. Ivan wrinkled his face at the action and stifled a yawn. Matthew laughed quietly, "I'll take that as a yes," he said in a whisper. "Well get out your sleeping bag and don't fall asleep on me just yet. Remember? We're staying up just a little bit later so you can meet the friend I mentioned earlier."

You mean they haven't arrived yet?! Ivan thought tiredly to himself, Who am I meeting, some night owl?! It's nearly 10 at night! "When will this "friend" of yours be coming?" Ivan asked.

"...Around 10 minutes or so, it depends," Matthew replied as he made his way over to his closet. Reaching in the closet, Matthew pulled out a sleeping bag of his own and began to roll it out onto his floor in front of his doorway.

"You are not going to sleep in your bed?" Ivan gave Matthew a weird look.

"No. This is a sleepover and it's fun to sleep on the floor every once and awhile," Matthew grabbed a pillow from his bed and put it at one end of his sleeping bag, he grabbed another pillow and tossed it towards Ivan,who caught the object before it could make contact with his head.

Ivan stood up and grabbed his own sleeping bag from its place leaning against the wall. Taking a moment to scan the area, Ivan decided to lay his sleeping bag perpendicular to Matthew's to the side of the room. Matthew made no move to object the arraignment. Ivan set down the pillow Matvey had tossed him on the opened end of his sleeping bag before sitting down on it. Matvey did the same crossing his legs, he smiled.

"So what is this friend of yours like?" Ivan began trying to fill the time they had to wait for this said friend.

"Well, He's quiet, only says a few words," Matthew rambled in thought, "He's really small and light. I met him when I found him injured one day."

Ivan nodded, wondering if this small person was going to climb in through Matvey's window. That would be interesting to say in the least. Matvey stopped talking and glanced at his window, Well speak of the devil, Ivan thought. There was a slight tapping on the window and Matthew moved to get it, not before reaching under his bed and grabbing a leather glove, he slid the glove onto his left hand. ...What would he need that for? Ivan asked himself at the strange gesture.

Ivan pulled his eyes to the window, but Matvey moved in his way before Ivan could make out any figures. Opening the window Matthew reached his left, gloved hand out to help his friend in. What Ivan saw was not something that expected to see, Perched on Matthew's hand was none other than a snowy owl.

It ruffled its feathers a bit and adjusted itself on Matthew's hand. Matthew closed the window and the bird began to look around. It looked at Ivan with bright yellow irises, curiously it tilted its head a bit to the side.

"...You did not seem to mention that your 'friend' was an owl Matvey," Ivan said, his eyes never leaving the bird.

"No, but it doesn't make a difference really," Matthew shrugged.

It makes a pretty big damn difference if you ask me! Ivan thought.

"Who." The bird 'said', Matvey smiled.

"That's Ivan, my friend," Matthew said pointing to Ivan.

"Who," The bird again 'said', this time looking at Matthew, Matthew smiled.

"I'm Matthew!" He gave a quiet chuckle.

"... Matvey, I do not believe that the bird was asking for either of our names," Ivan looked at Matthew like he was foolish.

"I know that, but sometimes it's fun to pretend. Like he can actually hear you," Matthew held the owl up so that it was face level with him, "Isn't that right?" He cooed quietly.

"Um..." Ivan paused, unsure of how to respond to Matvey.

"Oh! Where are my manners, Ivan this is my friend Kumajirou," Matthew held up the owl in a presenting manner and the bird looked at Ivan again, Ivan looked back.

"...You said that you met, um... him, when you found him injured one day?" Ivan asked, trying to understand the predicament before him.

"Yeah. One day, about a year or so ago, I found Kumamaji in my backyard with an injured wing, on impulse I picked him up and brought Kumakero into my bathroom. I fixed up his wing and kept him in my room for about three months or so, giving him water and feeding him the mice or rats Samria would constantly catch. Once I let him go, I thought I would never see him again, but two nights later he came back for a quick visit, he comes by every couple of nights," Matthew answered sitting down across from Ivan.

"...That really dangerous you know. You could have gotten hurt yourself," Ivan said leaning in to get a bit of a closer look at the owl. The owl turned it's head ignoring him.

"Yeah, but Kumajikou is pretty docile for a wild animal," The bird gave a little screech at him, "I'm sorry, I mean 'majestic owl,'" Matthew said with a bit of sarcasm as he scratched the bird's feathers.

"Wait, didn't you just call him a different name just before?" Ivan asked, Matthew had changed the bird's name thrice now.

"...Well, I can't exactly remember what I named him when I first found him, it was something starting with Kuma, but that's all I remember. I keep changing it, I'm sorry," Matthew sheepishly rubbed the back of his neck with his free hand.

"Odd," Ivan simply stated, "May I touch him?"

"Oh yeah, he won't bite, just bring your hand forward slowly. So as to not startle him," Matthew held Kuma-whatever forward a bit .

Slowly such as Matvey advised, Ivan brought his hand forward. The owl looked at the hand curiously and then at Ivan. A little farther forward and Ivan was milimeters away from the ever soft looking white feathers. And then they touched. Ivan had thought right, the feathers were incredibly soft, he moved his hand through them slowly, feeling every soft feature of the owls feathers. Ivan smiled a bit and Matvey grinned at this.

"I think he likes you," Matthew said with a grin.

"Really?" Ivan asked still feeling the softness of Kuma-whatever's feathers, "How do you know?"

"When I showed Kumafreo to Al, well, it didn't exactly go well. Kuma screeched loudly and woke up my parents, I had to open the window and let him fly away before dad and papa found out what Al and I were doing up so late," Matthew had a bemused looked as remembered the event, a small smile crossed his lips.

Kuma-anything opened and closed his wings once Ivan's hand was gone. The owl gave a flap in attempt to move without actually flying. He adjusted his talons on Matvey's gloved hand.

"Looks like Kumajirou needs to go," Matthew said, he gave the bird a quick nuzzle before standing up and walking over to the window. Ivan got up with him.

Sticking Kumajirou (Ivan thinks that is what Matvey first introduced the owl as) and his hand, Matthew let the bird fly away. Ivan watched from behind as Kumajirou beat his large wings in a up and downward motion. Wow, Ivan thought to himself as the bird flew away. And with that Matthew and Ivan stood at the window looking out into the night sky.

~owo~

Matthew and Ivan lay in their sleeping bags, their heads near each other, light chatter was shared between the boys. The door had been cracked open to let Samria come in sometime during the night. Where she currently was, neither boys were quite sure.

Soon the chattering slowed, and almost no words were shared at all between the boys. Matthew left with a 'Bonne nuit Ivan' unsure if Ivan had even heard his words. It wasn't until Ivan replied with half mumbled words himself, something that seemed to be said in his own language, did Matthew finally close his eyes, content with the foreign words.

They did not know of the dreams that would visit them that night.

~OWO~

A/N: DONE! Ah-ha, ah-ha. I'm such a horrible person, I'm sorry readers, I'm a lazy ass. Wow I haven't updated since February. Fuck, I'm sorry again. But it's over 6,000 words (wow I have a lot to say) And it has that whole water scene for you darlings~ Actually when I was writing the changing scene specifically, I had to literally stop writing the scene because I was laughing too hard as I wrote it.

I hope to the next chapter after this one on saturday, seeing as how majority of it is already written out. Yeah. Like, once school is out I'm going to update again a lot faster. High School sucks balls as many know.

Kuma is an owl! Yeah, and a snowy owl to be more exact. I liked it better than making him a dog like most other fanfics.

AND GUEST REVIEWERS! (Please come off guest)

1st Guest: Thank You! I'm really not all that awesome, and this is only 'good quality' because I'm a bloody perfectionist, that and I read a lot, so I take from other authors. Also I've seen better fanfics than this that are also the author's first fanfic.

2nd Guest: Thank you. And I'm sorry I'm not a fast updater.

No translations this chapter (Ahh! I have a big French test tomorrow!).

I leave with this: 1. There is a suttle Sgt Frog reference in this, first person to find it gets a drawing reqest. 2. Do you feel as if I'm writing the characters as themselves? I feel like Russia is rather out of character... Thank you for reading!

owo~ InkFlow


	9. And Thus We Dream Once Again

As Perusual Meeting You

By: InkFlow

Chapter 9: And Thus We Dream Once Again

Ivan looked around the unfamiliar hallway. _Where am I?_ He asked himself. Silence surrounded him in the area. He took a cautious step forward, breaking the silence, it returned when he didn't move any further. His eyes scanned the unknown territory; he found fancy side tables and paintings lining the walls. _Am I dreaming? _Another step forward; Ivan brought his gaze up to one of the pictures, which turned out to be a painted portrait of a strange woman he didn't recognize. He looks around more, it was rather dark in the hallway he currently stood in, but, he seemed to be giving off some kind of light that filled the area closest to his body.

Cautiously, Ivan took another few steps forward, the impact from his foot to the ground making the only detectable noise. His eyes scanned more of the pictures lining the walls. There were more people that he didn't recognize, and then, there was a picture of Matthew, or at least what looked to be Matthew. A small painting of a young boy sat up on the wall, he had the same ridiculous hair curl as Matthew, and the same vibrant blue-violet eyes. The boy sat with a small smile adorning his face. Ivan studied the picture for a bit before he continued on, there were more pictures of what seemed to be Matthew, and others that looked to be Alfred, then there were more pictures of two men, dressed in fancy attire, they must have been Matthew and Alfred's fathers, they had the same likeness of the two men. Both men could be found in many of the pictures with Alfred and Matthew.

Ivan eventually managed to walk out of the hallway and into a more opened up area. He looked to his right, finding he was on a balcony overlooking a rather large and grand looking room.

"...Where am I?" His voice echoed into the large room. There was no answer.

Ivan's eyes trailed down the stairs and to the floor of the large room. He then traced his eyes back up the other staircase winding up to a balcony exactly like the one he stood at on the opposite side of the room. Almost immediately he saw Matthew shoot out from behind the wall and onto the balcony opposite of Ivan. For some reason, Matthew seemed to be glowing like a light much like Ivan himself. He didn't have a shirt and wore only pajama bottems, this didn't seem to bother him at all as he followed the stairs down into the large room. A worried face seemed to grace Matthew's features as he searched for something.

"Matvey?" Ivan finally spoke up.

"!" Matthew shot around to look up at Ivan, "Ivan?!" He asked in question, "What are you doing here?"

"I should ask you the same thing, and what am I doing here?" Ivan asked, clearly confused.

"...I, don't..." Matthew trailed, before being cut off by someone else.

"Matthew! You're early" A woman's voice seemed to say. Both men's heads shot towards the large staircase at the front of the room, where a third staircase fed into it going straight down.

_Who is she?_ Ivan asked himself. Watching as the woman shuffled over to the still currently shirtless Matthew. She didn't glow like he and Mathew did.

"What do you mean I'm early?" Matthew asked turning his attention away from Ivan.

"It's not night time yet," she explained.

"... It hasn't been three months yet," Matthew seemed to explain to her.

_What was going on?_ Ivan's mind began racing. "W-what's going on?"

Both heads looked over towards Ivan. The girl gave him a disgusted look, Matthew didn't seem to notice, before she forced confused expression upon her face. "And who might you be?" She asked in near sickeningly sweet way.

"..." Ivan's mind when on the defensive and his borders raised, he put on a disturbed smiled and brought his voice up an octave to give himself a childish appearance. "Ah, I am Ivan, Matvey's friend," he replied in a false happy voice.

She cringed as the nickname and smiled like a murderer, "Is that so?"

"Da, it is." He gave a short, frightening chuckle as to out-creep her, "And who might you be?" He inquired. She remained her composure.

Matthew watched both of them, seeming unfazed by their actions. He was lost in some other thounght at the moment.

She smiled and tensions rose, "My name is Carieve; I too am Matthew's friend. I've heard a bit about you," the newly dubbed Carieve stated, adding emphasis on Matthew's name, as if daring Ivan to use his nickname for Matthew.

"Is that so?" Ivan began to descend the stairs, "I haven't heard anything about you," he continued.

"What are you doing here Ivan?" Matthew asked breaking in to the creepy contest his two 'friends' seemed to be having.

"I don't know …I'd like to know though," Ivan replied his voice lowering to its normal pitch, "I don't know where I am, or what's going on."

"It's simple my dear," Carieve spoke up again in her sickeningly sweet voice, "This is a dream."

"A dream? ...I thought so. but-" Ivan stopped himself before he could continue.

"But what?" She asked. Ivan looked at her, he didn't want to trust her, he didn't know why, she was just, _sickening._

Matthew leaned over slightly and cupped his hands around Carieve's ear. He whispered something Ivan could not hear. What could they be hiding?

"Ivan, have you ever had a dream of this place, or any castle like place for the matter, before?" Matthew finally asked, bringing his attention away from the woman he already somehow despised.

"Umm..." Ivan thought for a moment. No, he hadn't really had dreams like that, "No, this is really odd. I've never had a dream like this before. And never in a castle... Why are we in a castle Matvey?" Ivan looked up and around at the elaborate decorations that still adorned the ceiling of the rather grand hall.

Matthew shrugged, "It's a dream, who knows," Matthew's eyes didn't meet Ivan's they seemed to purposely avoid his. Meanwhile Carieve constantly bore her eyes into Ivan, glaring and glaring at him, Ivan simply ignored the horrid woman.

"But, you're apart of my dream, da? So you should know," Ivan said still trying to pry answers from Matthew.

"Whatever the case, this dream is going to end and you're going to wake up soon enough," Carieve spoke up.

"What?-"

"Wake up Ivan, Wake up!" Matthew began to say.

"W-wait," Ivan felt himself drawing away from the dream world and back into the waking reality.

"Wake up, Wake up Ivan!" Matthew's voice drew farther and farther away and his image grew more and more blurry.

"Ma-tvey," one last word before Matthew and Carieve finally faded from his view.

~owo~

"Huh?!" Ivan gasped and shot upright. He was breathing heavily and his body was in a cold sweat. His eyes darted around the mostly dark room, with what little moonlight he recieved from the window Ivan realized he was in Matthew's room. Half of his body was still encased in a sleeping bag while the rest stood upright with the cool air of Matthew's room lapping over his bare arms, so he was just asleep. He remembered now, he was at Matvey's house, and-

"Wa-ke up-nnnzzzz" Ivan looked in the direction of the voice just to his left. It was Matthew, was he... Talking in his sleep? "W-wake up" A tired voice said again, it was Matthew's.

"Matvey?" Ivan whispered, seeing if his friend showed any signs of being awake.

... No responce. He must have been sleep talking. But, if Ivan heard right, Matthew said wake up, just like the Matthew in his dream. Strange, what does that mean?

Ivan shook his head. Ridiculous, it was just a dream, nothing more. Ivan snuck once more glance at Matthew's sleeping figure, he made no other sounds besides quiet, steady breaths. Ivan leaned back onto the ground, bringing the sleeping bag and blanket over his body, _Just a dream,_ he reassured himself. And sleep consumed his body once more.

He did not hear Matthew speak once again, "You do-n't like h-mmm do you?"

"Why not?"

~OWO~

A/N: Confused the crap out of you readers again didn't I? *Evil Laughter* Don't worry darlings, I will explain soon.

I was wondering though in the last chapter Arthur mentioned Matt and Al doing 'Training'. I was wondering if you readers actually wanted me to write that out or not, because I don't really have any ideas on what I would do with that scene and it might just make things even more confusing (not to mention slower). So yeah tell me what you think about that.

Again no French, but I've got a final in French in a couple of days so that will be fun.

Responses: (Flaming Rose get off guest please) A. where the hell are you getting the blow pop from, gurl I didn't say sexual things, Don't blame me! I simply stripped Cananerda of his 'dignity' in a doodle and then wrote it out into the first chapter of this crap. None o' yo' 'INNOCENCE' things. *z-snap*

B. ...Oops I killed her with cuteness. *not sorry* and you said see you tomorrow as if you knew me, do I know you in real life or is that just how you review? I DON'T EVEN HAVE ANY SCISSORS TO RUN WITH! O3O~

C. (Seriously gurl come off guest! three reviews all at once) Here's the new Chappie, and more will come 'faster' once June starts. (No rhyming in my reviews please) (No it's ok I really don't give a fuck.)

Ok, more chapters soon 'cause I want to finish this up and work on something else. (guess what I have over 60 fanfiction ideas, yeah.

owo~ InkFlow


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